VIETNAM - Bird carriers slaughtered

[Lyro]

VIETNAMESE STORKS DESTROYED IN BIRD FLU SCARE
August 5, 2006 (ABC Radio Australia)

Animal health workers in Vietnam have killed 53 wild storks at a theme park in Ho Chi Minh City after random tests showed two of the birds carried a strain of the avian influenza virus.

An official at the park says the findings of the H5 component, part of the H5N1 poultry virus, led to the slaughter of the birds even though they all appeared healthy.

Wild birds are natural hosts of bird flu viruses and often don't show symptoms but can pass the viruses to poultry.

H5N1 has killed 42 people in Vietnam since late 2003, but there have been no human infections detected in the Southeast Asian country this year.

Source: www.radioaustralia.net.au/news/stories/s1707170.htm?Vietnam

 

[Shannon Bennett]

Re: VIETNAM - Bird carriers slaughtered

We find another natural host, first ducks, now swans. I strongly suspect seagulls will find their way onto this list as well. Few other birds could explain the happenstance of two ships at sea, off two different coasts of Africa, that would both simultaneously come down with the first cases of the more virulent strain of the Spanish Lady.

 

[Sharpe]

Re: VIETNAM - Bird carriers slaughtered

We find another natural host, first ducks, now swans. I strongly suspect seagulls will find their way onto this list as well. Few other birds could explain the happenstance of two ships at sea, off two different coasts of Africa, that would both simultaneously come down with the first cases of the more virulent strain of the Spanish Lady.

I disagree slightly. I think seagulls are more likely to be the victims rather than the carriers. They've been dying all over Europe and Asia.

 

[Shannon Bennett]

Re: VIETNAM - Bird carriers slaughtered

Either situation would have the same outcome.

 

[Lyro]

VIETNAM - Bird carriers slaughtered

More news coming from Ho Chi Minh City...

***

VIETNAM FINDS MORE BIRD FLU-INFECTED FOWL IN SOUTH
By Thank Nien (Reuters)
Friday, August 11, 2006

A farmer feeds chickens at a private chicken farm in the suburbs of Hanoi
Vietnam, worried about a recurrence of the H5N1 bird flu which has already killed 42 of its people, has found more ducks and geese infected with a strain of avian influenza, state media reported Friday.

Photo: A farmer feeds chickens at a
private chicken farm in the suburbs of Hanoi.

Dong Manh Hoa, head of the Ho Chi Minh City Regional Veterinary Centre, said Thursday tests of the waterfowl in Tien Giang, Long An and Ben Tre provinces revealed the H5 subtype virus. A Ben Tre official told Reuters Thursday more than 50 healthy waterfowl had been killed in the province after tests showed they had the H5 subtype, but there had been no outbreaks. The H5N1 virus swept across much of Asia in late 2003 and, although it has shown no signs of doing so yet, experts fear it could mutate into a form that can pass easily between people, triggering a pandemic which might kill millions. It has not killed anyone in Vietnam this year, but recurrences in Thailand, Laos and China have alarmed Hanoi officials worried their country has become complacent.

In an urgent directive issued Thursday, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung told officials "to focus strongly on instructing and deploying forces to carry out synchronised, preventive measures". Officials say a failure to control waterfowl, which can be silent carriers of bird flu, made Vietnam vulnerable to new outbreaks and wild birds believed to carry H5N1 would migrate soon from the north, raising the risk of outbreaks. Farmers in the Mekong Delta have been raising ducks in large numbers despite a ban on breeding waterfowl due to remain in place until February 2007. At this time of year, when a rice harvest is underway in the region, ducks usually roam from field to field feeding on spilled grain.

Source: www.thanhniennews.com/healthy/?catid=8&newsid=18728

 

[Sharpe]

Re: VIETNAM - Bird carriers slaughtered

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August 11, 2006 00:04 ET (04:04 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2006 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
[/FONT] <table width="100%"> <tbody><tr><td class="TakeTime" valign="top">11 Aug 2006 04:20 GMT DJ Vietnam Finds Bird Flu Virus In Poultry 1st Time This Yr</td><td align="right" valign="bottom">

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[FONT=Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif] HANOI (AP)--Vietnam on Friday reported its first cases of bird flu this year in poultry, igniting fears of a possible resurgence of the H5N1 virus in the country that had been hailed for controlling its spread.

The virus was detected in two ducks and two geese in random testing in southern Ben Tre province, said Mai Van Hiep, director of the Ben Tre Animal Health Bureau.

Officials killed 30 geese on Monday in the affected area, but the ducks had already been sold last month, he said. The samples were taken in late June, but the results were not returned until last week. [/FONT]
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