Veterinary officials get rid of eggs and birds infected with Avian Influenza at a farm in Imphal.
Posted on 07/26/2007 5:08:18 PM PDT by DeaconBenjamin
NEW DELHI — India's government on Thursday confirmed an outbreak of H5N1-strain bird flu at a poultry farm in the northeastern state of Manipur, marking the country's first reported outbreak since February last year.
Health officials said the highly virulent H5NI strain, which can infect humans, was detected in samples taken from birds that had died suddenly at the farm in Chingmeirong village on the outskirts of Imphal, capital of the insurgency-hit state that borders Myanmar.
*Sigh* If only they would EAT the birds before they caught the sniffles, they wouldn’t be in a panic because they can’t get Nyquil.
The Manipur government on Thursday began exterminating over 1.6 lakh fowls in a specified avian influenza-hit zone. Rain and medical check-up of the culling team, however, delayed the exercise by over 10 hours.
According to Dorendro Singh, director of the state’s animal husbandry department, 19 teams comprising five members each sent to different poultry farms in the “danger zone.” Other than the weather, ensuring immunity to the exterminators belated the start of the operation. “There’s no feedback from the teams yet, but they have been told to do the job as fast as possible,” Singh said.
All fowls — farm as well as local varieties — targeted for slaughter are within a radius of 5 km from the affected farm in the Chingmeirong area in Imphal East district. They include some 5,000 birds at the central poultry Farm in the city’s Mantripukhri area. A government spokesman said the culling order invited brief protests, but “we convinced poultry farm owners about the impact bird flu can have on humans”. The government, he added, would be paying poultry owners within the sanitisation zone at least Rs 60 lakh as compensation. The government has also appealed the hotels to stop selling chicken for the time being.
Meanwhile, veterinary officials have not been able to ascertain the source of the avian flu virus that killed the fowls in Chingmeirong. Officials had earlier suspected the virus might have come from Myanmar.
Veterinary officials get rid of eggs and birds infected with Avian Influenza at a farm in Imphal.
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