AVIAN INFLUENZA, POULTRY, H7 - USA (MARYLAND)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41458-2004Mar8.html Eastern Shore Farmers Grapple with Avian Flu Outbreak
Over the weekend, state authorities confirmed that the outbreak at the
commercial poultry farm in Worcester County was the same strain identified
at 2 Eastern Shore farms in Delaware in early February 2004. By yesterday
afternoon, Maryland officials had strengthened already strict measures to
contain the disease and announced that tests on all 8 farms within 2 miles
of the infected site had come back negative.
Still, news of those results -- as well as negative tests at 2 other farms
in the region -- did little to ease renewed fears among farmers that avian
flu could spread through the region's USD 1.5 billion poultry industry with
devastating effect.
Joe Chisholm, the president of Delmarva Poultry Industry Inc., a regional
trade group, said that until Friday, he and other poultry farmers had taken
comfort in the precautions adopted after the February 2004 outbreak,
including statewide bans on the sale of live poultry in both Maryland and
Delaware.
Also reassuring was the fact that tests of more than 40 percent of the
region's poultry farms since the disease surfaced had all come back
negative. "We were starting to feel like maybe [avian flu] was just limited
to those 2 farms in Delaware, like maybe we were going to be okay,"
Chisholm said. "Now we feel like we have no control. We can do everything
100 percent right, and this can still happen to us."
More than 27 nations have placed varying restrictions on imports of U.S.
poultry in response to the appearance of avian flu in Delaware and Texas.
Unlike versions of the avian flu that have appeared in Asia, the strain
found in Delaware and Maryland has no history of harming humans, officials
said. However, it can be deadly to birds. An airborne respiratory illness,
Avian flu spreads easily among chickens through nasal and eye secretions as
well as manure. It can be transmitted from one farm to another by
equipment, vehicles, and people whose clothing or shoes have come in
contact with the virus.
All 118 000 broilers at the infected farm were depopulated Sunday, in
keeping with state policy, said Sue duPont, a spokeswoman for the Maryland
Department of Agriculture (MDA). The company owning those chickens --
which duPont would not identify -- has voluntarily decided to destroy 210
000 birds at a second farm that shared equipment with the first, she said.
The chickens on commercial poultry farms generally are owned by large
poultry companies, known as integrators. These companies, such as Perdue
Farms and Tysons Foods Inc., pay farmers roughly USD 230 per 1000 birds for
raising each chicken to maturity, Chisholm said. When a flock must be
destroyed because of illness, the farmer loses that payment. Thus, the 328
000 birds destroyed at the 2 affected Maryland farms likely represent a
loss of about USD 75 000 to the farmer.
Farmers do not tend to be insured for such occurrences, Chisholm added. And
though some integrators offer farmers a special disaster payment if a flock
must be destroyed, it is "a long way" from what the farmer would otherwise
have received, he said.
Maryland's attempts to stem the outbreak will also affect farmers. For
instance, state Agriculture Secretary Lewis R. Riley has extended an
earlier ban on spreading poultry manure in areas northeast of Route 50 to
the entire Eastern Shore. That could pose difficulties for grain farmers,
who are entering planting season.
Poultry integrators also will be holding off on sending new chickens to
farms such as Chisholm's that are located within 6 miles of the infected
farm in Maryland.