Penguins get Norway's first bird flu shots
Associated Press
<!-- begin body-content -->OSLO, Norway - Eight penguins became the first birds in Norway vaccinated against bird flu Friday after an aquarium won an eight-month battle with health authorities, a newspaper reported.
"The safest birds in the Nordic region," declared a headline in Bergen's Tidende newspaper. The paper said the birds were among the first in northern Europe to get the vaccine.
The Bergen Aquarium, in western Norway's main city, had been trying since October to get government authorization for the vaccinations.
The Norwegian Food Protection Authority, which must approve such cases, refused since no outbreaks of the deadly H5N1 strain have been found in Norway and it frowns on overuse use of vaccines.
On Friday, the authority relented and granted approval. But after two of the eight birds were vaccinated, it withdrew the permit, only to give the final go ahead a few hours later.
"When we had already vaccinated two, they said go ahead and do the rest," Aquarium director Kees Ekeli was quoted as saying. He said the agency was changing its rules so that "zoos and aquariums are not treated the same as farmers with 25,000 hens."
The vaccine does not guarantee the birds won't contract H5N1 but helps protect against influenza.
According to the Norwegian news agency NTB, the first bird vaccinated was 9-month-old Pingrid Alexandra, whose name plays on that of Norway's future queen, Ingrid Alexandra.
Pingrid Alexandra promptly threw up, while the other birds did not appear to have an adverse reaction.
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/newssentinel/news/local/14399782.htm
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Associated Press
<!-- begin body-content -->OSLO, Norway - Eight penguins became the first birds in Norway vaccinated against bird flu Friday after an aquarium won an eight-month battle with health authorities, a newspaper reported.
"The safest birds in the Nordic region," declared a headline in Bergen's Tidende newspaper. The paper said the birds were among the first in northern Europe to get the vaccine.
The Bergen Aquarium, in western Norway's main city, had been trying since October to get government authorization for the vaccinations.
The Norwegian Food Protection Authority, which must approve such cases, refused since no outbreaks of the deadly H5N1 strain have been found in Norway and it frowns on overuse use of vaccines.
On Friday, the authority relented and granted approval. But after two of the eight birds were vaccinated, it withdrew the permit, only to give the final go ahead a few hours later.
"When we had already vaccinated two, they said go ahead and do the rest," Aquarium director Kees Ekeli was quoted as saying. He said the agency was changing its rules so that "zoos and aquariums are not treated the same as farmers with 25,000 hens."
The vaccine does not guarantee the birds won't contract H5N1 but helps protect against influenza.
According to the Norwegian news agency NTB, the first bird vaccinated was 9-month-old Pingrid Alexandra, whose name plays on that of Norway's future queen, Ingrid Alexandra.
Pingrid Alexandra promptly threw up, while the other birds did not appear to have an adverse reaction.
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/newssentinel/news/local/14399782.htm
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