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[kyselak]

Wrath of God behind Israel bird flu, says rabbi    

JERUSALEM, March 21 (Reuters) - An outbreak of deadly bird
flu in Israel is God's punishment for calls in election ads to
legalise gay marriages, according to Rabbi David Basri, a
prominent sage preaching Kabbalah or Jewish mysticism.
    "The Bible says that God punishes depravity first through
plagues against animals and then in people," Basri said in a
religious edict quoted by his son.
    Basri said he hoped the deaths of hundreds of thousands of
turkeys and chickens would help atone for what he called the
sins of left-wing Israeli political parties, the son, Rabbi
Yitzhak Basri, told Reuters, a week before a national election.
    The bird flu outbreak stemmed from far-left political
parties "strengthening and encouraging homosexuality," Rabbi
Basri's son quoted him as saying.
    One of the parties aired an election commercial depicting
two brides kissing. Some campaign advertisements also called for
homosexual marriages to be legalised in Israel.
    Basri is a prominent Kabbalist and author of commentaries on
the Zohar, the main Kabbalah mystical text.

211227 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

Malaysia fears bird flu may spread nationwide: junior minister

    ATTENTION - ADDS PM's quotes, nationwide testing ///
    
    KUALA LUMPUR, March 21, 2006 (AFP) - A Malaysian deputy minister
warned Tuesday that the deadly bird flu virus may spread nationwide
after two more outbreaks were reported in a northern state.
    "There is always the possibility (of this)," Deputy Agriculture
Minister Mah Siew Keong told reporters.
    "We hope there will be not be many more new cases. We are taking
all the steps. The ministry is concerned at the outbreaks."
    An official in the northern state of Perak reported two new
outbreaks of the H5N1 strain there, at Changkat Legong and at Titi
Gantung, which is 60 kilometres (37 miles) west of Changkat Legong.
    But no birds have died of the disease in the two areas, Perak
agriculture committee chairman Mohamad Radzi Manan was quoted as
saying by Bernama news agency.
    Mohamad Radzi said veterinary officials have began to slaughter
poultry in the two areas and expect to kill some 3,000 birds.
    Separately, Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told reporters
the outbreak was under control and that he had met with Agriculture
Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and Health Minister Chua Soi Lek following
the latest outbreaks, one of which is not far from his own
constituency.
    "Both of them are managing the situation very well," he said
adding that Malaysia was always in a state of readiness to deal with
new outbreaks.
    Muhyiddin said authorities would start taking samples from fowls
nationwide for H5N1 after the latest outbreaks.
    "We have instructed all state veterinary directors to carry out
comprehensive samplings. Previously, we tested only the affected
areas but now each state must do it," he was quoted as saying by the
Bernama news agency.
    He said a comprehensive plan would be drawn up to deal with the
possibility of a nationwide outbreak.
    In the first outbreak in Malaysia in more than a year, H5N1 was
detected last month in 40 free-range chickens in four villages in
Gombak near Kuala Lumpur.
    Last Thursday Malaysia announced outbreaks of H5N1 in an
eco-park and at Changkat Tualang, which is within five kilometres of
Changkat Legong.
    On Monday an outbreak of H5N1 was announced in Permatang Bagak
village in Penang state bordering Perak.
    "Unfortunately, yesterday the bird flu was confirmed in mainland
Penang. So it means since last month's outbreak in Gombak, it has
spread to Perak and now it is confirmed in Penang," Mah said, adding
that authorities have yet to confirm how the birds were infected.
    He said neighbouring Singapore had banned poultry imports from
Perak, which is one of Malaysia's biggest exporters of poultry.
    Officials have slaughtered tens of thousands of birds at the
site of outbreaks. No human cases of bird flu have been reported so
far in the country.
    About 100 people have died from bird flu since 2003, most of
them in Asia.
    ey-hh/mtp
    
AFP 211045 GMT MAR 06

[kyselak]

Humans test negative in India's bird flu-hit stat    

MUMBAI, March 21 (Reuters) - All four people quarantined in
western India for flu-like symptoms have tested negative for
bird flu, officials said on Tuesday, as fears of human
infection from avian influenza eased in the world's second most
populous nation.
    The four people, including a doctor and a five-year-old
girl, were from Jalgaon district in Maharashtra state where
India's second outbreak of the H5N1 strain of bird flu in
poultry was reported last week.
    Jalgaon is next door to Nandurbar district where the first
outbreak occurred last month.
    "The test results of the four under observation are
negative, but they are being given Tamiflu as a precaution,"
T.P. Doke, Maharashtra's health director, said, referring to
the drug used to fight bird flu in humans.
    So far, India has reported no human infections from bird
flu.
    Officials say another 95 human blood samples from Jalgaon
had been sent for testing, but termed the tests a matter of
"academic interest".
    More than 90,000 birds have been culled in Jalgaon and
authorities were concentrating their efforts on cleaning up
four villages spread over 1,100 square km (425 square miles) in
the district where backyard poultry was found infected with
bird flu.
    "We are disinfecting homes and cleaning up backyards and
the drainage systems," Bijay Kumar, the state's animal
husbandry commissioner, said

[kyselak]

Why is Europe so neurotic about bird flu?

    by Isabel Parenthoen
    
    PARIS, March 21, 2006 (AFP) - Bird flu has come to Europe and,
if the newspapers are any guide, many Europeans are running around
like, well, headless chickens.
    In some countries, sales of poultry have hit the floor. Panicky
pet-owners have dumped their dog or cat, fearing that felines and
canines can somehow pass on an avian virus.
    And police are fed up with fielding calls from terrified people
who have spotted a dead pigeon or a stork building its nest -- and,
in one case in eastern France, an owl that made a menacing hoot.
    The daftness gives the lie to a continent that prides itself on
having the world's richest history in science, the most educated
population and a communications system that is second to none.
    But there is no surprise among historians and food experts, who
say this irrationality has deep roots.
    From the 14th-century plague known as the Black Death to
cholera, typhoid and killer influenza, Europe has experienced waves
of deadly pandemics that, like bird flu, came from abroad, they
say.
    And, over the past 20 years, confidence in food safety and
government reassurance has been badly undermined by a series of
scares.
    "We mistrust the authorities and their utterances," says French
historian Madeleine Ferrieres.
    Antoine Flahault, who runs a French doctors' watchdog group
called Sentinels for Disease Surveillance, agrees.
    "There is a certain logic which says you're better off not
eating chicken, when you think about all the past lies and present
confusion," he said.
    "When you are being told that there is zero risk, you remain on
your guard, he said.
    The source for much of Europe's edginess was the April 1986
Chernobyl disaster. The stricken Soviet nuclear reactor spewed
radioactive dust over swathes of Europe and spurred the rise of the
green movement, which feeds on worries about food and environmental
safety.
    In France, Chernobyl is recalled for the government's blithe
assurance that no contamination had fallen on French soil. As wags
suggested, this meant the cloud had obediently stopped at the
national border.
    Then along came bovine spongeiform encephalopathy (BSE), which
dealt a blow to Britain's beef industry that endures to this day.
    Britons today recall the moment in 1990, at the height of the
scare, when the then agriculture minister, John Gummer, thrust a
fairground beefburger into his child's mouth to prove that the meat
was safe.
    Other episodes have been dioxin-tainted chicken and worries
about US hormone-treated beef and genetically-modified crops. But on
other continents, these opinion-shaping events either have not
happened, nor have they been elevated to public consciousness by a
powerful green movement.
    A contributing factor has been big changes in European eating
habits, thanks to better hygiene and just-in-time supermarket
delivery.
    In Europe "we have no longer know how to deal with suspicious
foods," noted Ferrieres.
    In the past, she said, meat in Europe was boiled or stewed for a
long time, both to tenderise it and kill bugs, but this folk wisdom
has disappeared in favour of lightly cooked flesh demanded by modern
recipes.
    Fanning the worries has been the emergence of terrifying new
diseases that the authorities in Europe, as elsewhere, have so often
fumbled. They include AIDS, in which for a while HIV-contaminated
blood was allowed to enter blood banks, and Severe Acute Respiratory
Syndrome (SARS).
    Rene Favier, a historian who writes on human responses to
catastrophes, said the present alarm has an ironic tinge: People
mistrust their government yet at the same time turn to it for help.
    "The risk is that governments are fearful of looking inactive so
they launch big public-awareness campaigns to inform and reassure.
This turns out to be counter-productive because it ends up up
boosting people's worries," said Favier.
    ih-ri/ns/wdb
    
AFP 210844 GMT MAR 06

[kyselak]

Nigeria's bird flu woes reveal poor country weaknesses to
deadly virus

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) _ The five weeks since a deadly bird
flu virus was first detected in Nigeria provide a troubling
illustration of what can happen when H5N1 hits an
undeveloped country with a weak and often corrupt political
system and two few resources devoted to health. Officials
have been overwhelmed, responding too late and with too
little as the disease spread quickly across Africa's most
populous country and then on to its neighbors. Each week
seems to bring more questions than answers _ How far has it
already spread? Have humans been infected? International
health officials fear the H5N1 strain will evolve into a
virus that can be transmitted easily between people and
become a pandemic. H5N1's spread to places like Nigeria,
where monitoring is difficult, has been particularly
worrying. Nigeria has yet to deploy medical teams equipped
to take blood samples and systematically determine whether
H5N1 has infected humans living near farms where the virus
has been found in birds.

211011 mar 06GMT

[kyselak]

France confirms new case of deadly bird flu strain in wild
duck

PARIS (AP) _ A new case of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird
flu has been found in a wild duck in a part of southeastern
France already hit by the disease, the Agriculture Ministry
said Tuesday. The duck was found dead on March 15 in the
town of Divonne-les-Bains, near the Swiss border, in the
Ain region that has already taken broad measures to prevent
the spread of avian flu. The discovery, which prompted
authorities to set up a security zone, was in the area
where another H5N1 case was found late last month in
another wild duck, the ministry said in a statement. At
least 32 wild birds have been found in France with the flu.
France also detected the lethal H5N1 flu last month on a
turkey farm, the first commercial poultry in the European
Union hit by the virus. Last week, as fears of the virus
were subsiding, the state administrator for the Ain region
announced that some poultry could go on sale again after a
temporary ban following the first cases of the bird flu.

211049 mar 06GMT

[kyselak]

Vietnam successfully synthesizes key ingredient for bird
flu drug

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) _ Vietnamese scientists have
successfully synthesized the main ingredient for the
antiviral drug Tamiflu, which the country hopes to mass
produce in the next two years, an official said Tuesday.
Tran Van Sung, director of the Chemistry Institute said his
agency, which has been working on the project for more than
five months, has synthesized 2.5 grams of oseltavimir
phosphate from anise. Sung said the Ministry of Science and
Technology is expected to provide the institute with funds
for more research on the manufacturing process. Sung said
his project is separate from an agreement reached between
Vietnam and Swiss drugmaker Roche last year, where Roche
agreed to provide the country with the raw drug materials
so that it could be put in capsule form in the communist
country.

211046 mar 06GMT

[bina]

two more kibbutzim/moshavim hit with the avian flu: amioz and nir oz (also in the west negev, all the places are close to eachother....

my dead duck came back negative in the mean time.....

both places have lots of thai workers, and guess hwo are doing the dirty deeds of disposing of dead carcasses and poisoning the water, thai workers!!! no body else agreed to do it even when the salary was tripled....

[kyselak]

Get vaccine or face mass bird culls -UK farmers

By Elizabeth Piper

    LONDON, March 21 (Reuters) - Britain's organic farmers urged
the government on Tuesday to prepare stocks of vaccines to
protect free-range chickens from bird flu, saying no one could
stomach the mass culls seen during the foot-and-mouth outbreak.
    They praised the government for showing "more flexibility"
about using vaccination for controlling any outbreak of the
deadly H5N1 virus than it did in 2001 against foot and mouth,
but said an expanded vaccination policy should be launched now.
    "There is nothing left in the kill, kill, kill armoury used
to fight foot-and-mouth," a spokesman for organic campaign group
the Soil Association said.
    "Government has already got some vaccine stockpiled mainly
for exotic birds and those in zoos. That should be extended."
    Organic poultry farmers say vaccination is the only way to
protect their growing market, where production has increased by
35 percent over the past year.
    By bringing poultry indoors for more than three months to
escape infection, producers would lose their free-range status.
    "Securing the long-term future of sustainable,
welfare-friendly systems is essential if we are to build up over
the longer-term livestock which are...resistant to the seemingly
endless cycle of diseases that challenge our farming industry,"
Patrick Holden, the association's director, said.
    The Netherlands, France and Russia have launched vaccination
drives to fight bird flu, which has spread from Asia to the
Middle East, Africa and Europe. It has killed more than 90
people and millions of birds.
    But many Dutch farmers have chosen to wait, fearful that
vaccinated poultry might turn off consumers, and in France the
programme has been limited to a southwest region and to geese
and ducks. Russia is vaccinating domestic fowl.
    Britain's government has said it would keep an open mind on
using vaccination -- which some say would reduce the spread of
the H5N1 virus if it hit Britain -- but officials and advisers
say as yet there is no vaccination that is efficient.
    They say vaccination would take too long to administer and
could spread the disease by masking its symptoms.
    "Our position hasn't changed. We are keeping emergency
vaccination under consideration," a spokesman for the UK
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said.
    The government's chief scientific adviser, David King, said
for the time being his advice would also be to hold off.
    "My advice is...not to use the current vaccine except to
protect zoo birds that are caged and maintained in such a way
that they can be carefully observed," he told Reuters.
    "If you use the current vaccine, you are faced with one
which has not got a high efficiency of operation. It is highly
likely that vaccinated birds would become ill and would shed the
virus so that they can spread the virus to other birds."

REUTERS

211427 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

Romania detects H5 bird flu in poultry near Bucharest

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) _ Several chickens in a village
located just a few kilometers from the Romanian capital
have tested positive for an H5 subtype of bird flu, the
Agriculture Ministry said Tuesday. Further tests were
underway in Bucharest to confirm the diagnosis, which was
made by a mobile laboratory in the Pruni village, and
determine the strain of the virus. If the outbreak is
confirmed, the village will be placed under a strict
quarantine, health officials have said. The virus, which is
believed to be the deadly H5N1 strain, was detected this
month in 12 villages near the Black Sea. Health authorities
were discussing Tuesday a set of measures to be taken to
contain the virus, the Agriculture Ministry said. Experts
fear that the virus could infect pet birds and poultry on
the edges of Bucharest, a crowded city of 2.3 million where
quarantine measures would be difficult to enforce. Romania
reported its first cases of H5N1 in domestic fowl in
October in its eastern Danube Delta region, which is
transited by hundreds of thousands of migratory birds. No
human cases have been reported in the country.

211240 mar 06GMT

[kyselak]

US increases bird flu tests on wild birds
    
    WASHINGTON, March 21, 2006 (AFP) - The US government has decided
to sharply increase testing of wild birds for the deadly H5N1 strain
of bird flu in the hope of quickly detecting its arrival and
preventing an epizootic.
    As the disease spreads in Asia, Europe and Africa, health
authorities in Washington calculate that bird flu could reach US
shores this year or by the beginning of 2007, most likely through
birds migrating from Asia to North America by way of Alaska.
    "We do not know for sure what role wild migratory birds play in
the movement of this virus, but the potential exists for them to
carry this virus to North America, and we have a responsibility to
prepare for that possibility," said Secretary of the Interior Gale
Norton when she unveiled Monday an Interagency Strategic Plan for
the early detection of H5N1.
    "Working closely with our state, local and federal partners, we
can detect and respond to disease events involving wild birds and
screen birds for highly pathogenic H5N1 virus," Norton said.
    "These actions will help us provide an early warning to the
agriculture, public health and wildlife communities if the virus is
detected in migratory birds," she told a news conference, flanked by
the secretaries of agriculture and health, Mike Johanns and Mike
Leavitt.
    After bird flu was first detected in Southeast Asia in 1997, US
experts have tested more than 12,000 birds in the Alaska flyway
since 2000, and almost 4,000 birds in the Atlantic flyway.
    All those birds tested negatively for H5N1, the experts said.
    Under the new strategic plan, the US Department of Agriculture
and its cooperators plan to collect between 75,000 and 100,000
samples from live and dead wild birds. They also plan to collect
samples of water or feces from high-risk waterfowl habitats around
the United States.
    Authorities say they will test birds shot by hunters and live
fowl on farms and birds sold on the market.
    If an infection is detected, health authorities said they will
place the affected area under immediate quarantine and destroy all
birds potentially infected with the H5N1 virus.
    The primary goal is to prevent all contact between the infected
birds and people living in the area, as well as limiting the
devastating economic damage it could inflict on the 30 billion
dollar-a-year poultry industry.
    The epizootic currently affecting Asia, Europe and Africa has
prompted the destruction of tens of millions of chickens.
    The wild bird monitoring plan is part of President George W.
Bush's National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza Preparedness. Bush
allocated 29 million dollars for implementation of the wild bird
monitoring plan.
    Since 2003, about 200 people have been infected with H5N1, half
of whom have died.
    The disease so far is spreading by direct contact with infected
birds, not by person-to-person transmission. However, experts fear
the virus may mutate to a human variant, increasing the likelihood
of a pandemic.
    js/fgf/gd
AFP 211157 GMT MAR 06

[kyselak]

Russian authorities began vaccinating birds at Moscow's
Zoo

MOSCOW (AP) _ Russian authorities vaccinated birds at
Moscow's Zoo on Tuesday as part of a mass program for
domestic fowl aimed at preventing the spread of deadly bird
flu in Russia. But they had to catch them first, a task
which proved beyond some of the zoo's workers, who chased
after the uncooperative ones with nets. Workers hoped to
safeguard the birds in case the deadly H5N1 virus spreads
to Moscow. «We put the vaccine in the syringe and inject
it into the bird's chest,» said Nataliya Istratova, the
zoo's press secretary. «It's stressful for (the birds),
but better to be in the hands of a doctor than in death's
grip.» Russia's lower house, the Duma, heard testimony
Tuesday from the country's leading sanitary specialist on
measures being taken to deal with the spread of bird flu.
Gennady Onishchenko told deputies that the country had
«sufficient» supplies of vaccine and had set up a
nationwide monitoring headquarters. «The situation is
under control,» Onishchenko assured lawmakers.

211347 mar 06GM

[kyselak]

WHO figures for bird flu cases in humans

March 21 (Reuters) - The World Health Organisation (WHO)
said on Tuesday that bird flu has killed five people in
Azerbaijan.    Samples from 11 patients under investigation in Azerbaijan
for possible H5N1 infection have now been tested at the WHO
collaborating laboratory in the United Kingdom. Positive H5N1
results were obtained for seven of these patients. Five cases
were fatal.
    The bird toll consists of some 200 million birds which have
been culled.
    Following is a list of confirmed human cases of H5N1 from
the WHO in Geneva. Total cases includes survivors.
                             Deaths        Total cases
AZERBAIJAN                     5               7
CAMBODIA                       4               4
CHINA                            10             15
INDONESIA                     22             29
IRAQ                                2               2
THAILAND                      14              22
TURKEY                           4              12
VIETNAM                        42              93
-------------------------------------------------
TOTAL                        103             184
-------------------------------------------------
    Initial testing usually takes a day or two to confirm if
someone has H5N1. More detailed testing by government
laboratories or those affiliated with the WHO can take a week or
more.
    The H5N1 virus remains mainly a virus of birds, but experts
fear it could change into a form easily transmitted from person
to person and sweep the world, killing millions within weeks or
months.
    So far, most human cases can be traced to direct or indirect
contact with infected birds.

REUTERS

211628 Mrz 06

[kyselak]

Egypt reports 4th suspected human bird flu case    

CAIRO, March 21 (Reuters) - Egypt reported a fourth
suspected case of bird flu in humans on Tuesday, in a
17-year-old boy whose father had an outbreak of the disease on
his chicken farm in the Nile Delta on Saturday and Sunday.
    Health Minister Hatem el-Gabali, quoted by the state news
agency MENA, said the boy was taken to hospital in the town of
Tanta on Sunday and was receiving Tamiflu treatment. His
condition is "good and stable", he added.
    Laboratories are testing samples from the boy for the deadly
virus, the minister said.

211625 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

Poor nations need help fighting bird flu

By Jim Loney

    ATLANTA, March 21 (Reuters) - Fewer than three dozen
nations are capable of the early detection and quick response
needed to contain rapidly spreading bird flu and other viruses
that could threaten humans, a health official said on Tuesday.
    Combating the spread of the H5N1 avian influenza, which has
killed 103 people worldwide since it reemerged in 2003, has
become critical to governments across the globe because experts
fear it could become a pandemic that could kill millions and
cause catastrophic economic damage.
    "Developed countries are in position to practice
satisfactory early detection and rapid response. Worldwide,
only 20 to 30 countries are able to do that currently," said
Dr. Bernard Vallat, director-general of the World Organization
for Animal Health. "All the others, 140 or more, need help."
    Rich countries need to help poorer ones with detection
programs and compensation for farmers to prevent the global
spread of "zoonoses," diseases that can spread from animals to
humans, Vallat said at the International Conference of Emerging
Infectious Diseases in Atlanta.
    At a January conference in Beijing, governments and
organizations pledged $1.9 billion for a global "rapid
containment" program for bird flu.
    The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that bird flu
killed five young people in Azerbaijan, taking the global death
toll to 103 since it reemerged in late 2003. The virus has
spread with alarming speed in recent weeks, pushing into Europe
and Africa.
    The United States said this week it expects to see its
first cases of bird flu this year.
    Scientists say the virus is mutating and could evolve into
a form that would pass easily from human to human, potentially
causing a pandemic that could kill millions because people
would have no immunity.
    The issue of ways to contain it has been a primary topic of
debate between hundreds of health experts from some 80 nations
gathered in Atlanta this week for the infectious disease
conference.
    Vallat named European Union nations, the United States,
Canada, New Zealand and Australia as having the ability to
respond quickly to an outbreak of bird flu or another
threatening virus.
    Experts say outbreaks can be contained by early detection
and a quick response. U.S. wildlife officials, for example, are
monitoring Pacific bird migration routes for signs of bird flu
with the hope of tracking infected birds and giving advance
warning to U.S. poultry producers.
    But in many poor countries, it is nearly impossible to know
what diseases are circulating because of poor surveillance
programs.
    "There are parts of Africa without any surveillance,"
Vallat said. "Diseases can circulate for weeks in some parts of
Africa without being known by the authorities in the capital."
    One of the keys to early detection is a plan to compensate
farmers if governments decide to destroy infected flocks.
Outbreaks of H5N1 have forced the destruction of more than 200
million birds.
    But in poor countries, farmers may be reluctant to report
mysterious deaths in their flocks because they are uncertain
whether they will be paid for the lost birds.
    "You can't go to poor areas and take away the people's
livelihoods and the food supply and not have them compensated.
It's just not right," said Dr. Keiji Fukuda of the World Health
Organization.
    European nations such as France, Germany and the
Netherlands have compensation plans, as do Vietnam, Thailand
and other Asian countries. But many nations have not addressed
the issue.
    Vallat said the World Bank and other international
financing organizations were working to develop "sustainable"
compensation programs. For example, the World Bank made a loan
to Vietnam on the condition that it establish a sustainable
compensation plan for farmers.

REUTERS

212306 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

WHO says China to release bird flu samples following
criticism

BEIJING (AP) _ China has agreed to give the World Health
Organization bird flu samples from animals following
complaints that Beijing was hampering vaccine research by
withholding such samples, WHO officials said Wednesday. The
agency expects to receive about 20 virus samples within a
few weeks, Dr. Julie Hall, an official of the WHO office in
Beijing, said at a news conference. Experts say such
samples are critical to research on diagnostic tools and
vaccines, and they have criticized China's Agriculture
Ministry for refusing to release them to foreign
scientists. Chinese officials have been accused of
withholding samples to boost the status of China's own
scientists and possibly increase chances that they might
develop a potentially lucrative vaccine. The WHO regional
director for Asia, Dr. Shigeru Omi, also said China has to
improve its surveillance of animals for possible bird flu
outbreaks. None of China's 15 human cases of bird flu
occurred in areas where authorities had warning of possible
infection due to outbreaks detected in poultry, Omi said at
a news conference.

220349 mar 06GMT

[kyselak]

Vietnam cracks down on smuggled poultry from China

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) _ Vietnam has stepped up its crackdown
against poultry smuggled from China in an effort to prevent
the bird flu virus from reinfecting domestic flocks,
officials and state-controlled media reported Wednesday.
Agriculture Minister Cao Duc Phat was quoted by Nong Nghiep
(Agriculture) newspaper as telling the National Steering
Committee on Bird Flu Prevention and Control on Tuesday
that smuggled poultry from China is a «direct threat» to
Vietnam. «Due to huge differences in the price of poultry
domestically and that in China, smuggling of poultry across
the border has been very active,» Phat was quoted as
saying «This is a direct threat and it must be prevented
at any price.» Vietnam has reported no bird flu outbreaks
in poultry over the past three months and no human
infections since last November. Phat urged authorities in
the four northern border provinces, considered major
consumers of smuggled poultry, to eliminate places where
smuggled poultry were sold, it said. The minister also said
several government teams will be set up this week to
inspect the smuggling situation, the newspaper said.

220536 mar 06GMT

[kyselak]

Resolved: Why bird flu virus is not contagious between humans

by Richard Ingham

    PARIS, March 22, 2006 (AFP) - Virologists say they understand
why bird influenza in its present form does not spread among humans,
and the finding suggests the world may have a precious breathing
space to prepare for any flu pandemic.
    The reason lies in minute differences to cells located in the
top and bottom of the airways, the team report in Thursday's issue
of Nature, the weekly British science journal.
    To penetrate a cell, the spikes that stud an influenza virus
have to be able to bind to the cellular surface.
    The virus spike is like a key and the cell's docking point,
called a receptor, is like a lock. They both have to be the right
shape for the connection to happen.
    Scientists in the United States and Japan, led by Yoshihiro
Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin at Madison, found that avian
influenza viruses and human influenza viruses home in on slightly
different receptors.
    The receptor preferred by human flu is more prevalent in cells
in the mucous lining of the nose and sinus as well as the throat,
trachea and bronchi.
    But the receptor preferred by bird flu tends to be found among
cells deep in the lung, in ball-like structures called the alveoli.
    It means H5N1 is likely to hole up in a part of the airways that
does not cause coughing and sneezing -- the means by which the flu
virus is classically transmitted among humans.
    Bird flu is lethal to poultry and dangerous for humans in close
proximity to infected fowl. It has claimed more than 100 lives,
according to a World Health Organisation (WHO) toll.
    But, apart from a few anecdotal cases, the mortality has
occurred exclusively by direct transmission from birds to humans and
not among humans themselves. To acquire that contagiousness would
open the way to a pandemic.
    "Our findings indicate that H5N1 virus... can replicate
efficiently only in cells in the lower region of the respiratory
tract, where the avian virus receptor is prevalent," the paper
says.
    "This restriction may contribute to the inefficient
human-to-human transmission of H5N1 viruses seen to date."
    So what would turn H5N1 into a pandemic virus?
    First and foremost, it would need mutations in the spike, the
haemagglutinin (HA) molecule, to enable the virus to bind to cells
in the upper respiratory tract.
    This would enable the virus to spread via coughs and sneezes and
nasal mucus, which are caused by irritation to the upper airways.
    To boost its pandemic potential, the virus also needs changes in
its PB2 gene, which controls an enzyme essential for efficient
reproduction.
    "Nobody knows whether the virus will evolve into a pandemic
strain, but flu viruses constantly change," said Kawaoka.
    "Certainly, multiple mutations need to be accumulated for the
H5N1 to become a pandemic strain."
    The findings suggest scientists and public health agencies may
have more time to prepare for an eventual pandemic of avian
influenza, the team believe.
    Kawaoka's team exposed various tissues from the human
respiratory tract to a range of viruses in lab dishes.
    The viruses were the human strains H1N1 and H3N2 and the bird
strains H3N2 and H4N6. In addition, there were two H5N1 samples, one
taken from a human victim in Hong Kong and one from a duck in
Vietnam.
    Flu viruses reproduce sloppily, which induces slight changes in
their genetic code. This movement is called antigenic drift, and
explains why seasonal flu viruses keep changing and new updated
vaccines are needed.
    But they can also make big changes, called antigenic shift, in
which new genes are brought in, thus creating a new pathogen against
which no one has immunity. A novel flu virus that emerged after
World War I killed as many as 50 million people.
    By closely monitoring viruses from people infected with avian
flu, scientists can get a early warning as to whether these strains
are mutating into forms that will make it easier to fit into human
receptors, Kawaoka said.
    ri/bm
    
AFP 220558 GMT MAR 06

[kyselak]

India completes bird flu tests, clean-up progresses

MUMBAI, March 22 (Reuters) - India has checked and cleared
more than 400,000 people for bird flu in western India,
officials said on Wednesday, as a massive clean-up drive to
contain a second outbreak in poultry neared completion.
    The latest outbreak -- in backyard poultry in the Jalgaon
district of Maharashtra state -- was the highly pathogenic H5N1
strain of bird flu, but it has not infected people so far.
    "We have completed monitoring 440,000 people in and around
the four affected villages of Jalgaon. The week-long vigil is
over and there are no human cases," Vijay Satbir Singh,
Maharashtra's top health official, told Reuters.
    Of the hundreds of thousands of people monitored, only four
were quarantined in Jalgaon either with flu-like symptoms or as
a precaution, but they were expected to be discharged later on
Wednesday after their test results were negative for bird flu.
    More than 90,000 birds have been culled in Jalgaon and
authorities are concentrating their efforts on cleaning up four
villages spread over 1,100 square km (425 square miles) in the
district where backyard poultry were found infected with bird
flu.
    The clean-up operation -- disinfecting homes, backyards and
drains -- could be over in two days, officials said.
    Jalgaon is next door to Nandurbar district where the first
outbreak occurred last month.

[kyselak]

US schools urged to take bird flu preparations seriously

WASHINGTON (AP) _ U.S. schools _ recognized incubators of
respiratory diseases among children _ are being told to
plan for the possibility of an outbreak of bird flu.
Federal health leaders say it is not alarmist or premature
for schools to make preparations, such as finding ways to
teach children even if they've all been sent home. Other
issues include working out who closes schools and
quarantines children, who will keep the payroll running and
how to provide food to children who count on school meals.
The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu has infected more than
170 people and killed roughly 100. Officials say bird flu
is likely to arrive in U.S. birds this year. Experts fear
the virus could change into a form that passes easily among
people. In North Carolina on Tuesday, Education Secretary
Margaret Spellings joined Health and Human Services
Secretary Mike Leavitt to encourage schools to prepare.
Spellings said schools must be aware that they may have to
close their buildings _ or that their schools may need to
be used as makeshift hospitals, quarantine sites or
vaccination centers.

220832 mar 06GMT

[kyselak]

Indonesia bird flu campaign exposes loopholes

By Tomi Soetjipto

    PURWAKARTA, Indonesia, March 22 (Reuters) - Armed with
vaccines and green rubber boots, veterinarian Sri Wuryasturati
is ready to hit the road for Indonesia's anti-bird flu
campaign.
    Except she doesn't have the most essential item to get
going: a motorcycle.
    Dressed in a crisp brown civil servant's uniform and scarf,
the 42-year-old eventually takes off hours later to join
hundreds of veterinarians at the forefront of efforts to
contain bird flu in Indonesia, which has the world's second
highest number of human deaths from the disease.
    "We have got the vaccines ready," she said, pointing to a
refrigerator full of vaccines for poultry. "But sometimes some
of us can't go out because there are no vehicles."
    Without motorcycles, it is impossible for vaccinators to
reach villages in the morning before locals release their
backyard chickens into the fields.
    And there are lots of villages in Indonesia, a country of
220 million people spread across thousands of islands.
    Although Indonesia has launched high-profile, door-to-door
checks of poultry and birds in some provinces, the country
remains vulnerable because of poor planning and surveillance.
    Jakarta has set up a national team to combat bird flu, but
its members and volunteers only reach areas in the capital
while those in provinces rely on their own networks of
vaccinators.
    WEAKNESS
    Yoke Sudarbo, a programme manager at Partnership, a
U.N.-sponsored non-governmental organisation, said lack of
coordination mirrored the state of bureaucracy in Indonesia.
    "The weakness in handling bird flu is an example of
inadequate public services in Indonesia and it highlights the
country's poor infrastructure," said Sudarbo.
    Government officials in Jakarta said they were in control.
    "Support systems such as two-wheeled and four-wheeled
vehicles will be provided, we are working on that," said Mathur
Riyadi, head of the Agriculture Ministry's poultry department.
    He added the government had distributed leaflets to
government offices, outlining basic health and hygiene
procedures and safe ways to cook chicken.
    Indonesia has had 22 confirmed deaths from the H5N1 strain
of the avian flu virus since 2003 and half of those deaths have
occurred this year.
    The rising toll is worrying U.N. health officials who fear
the more the virus spreads in birds, the more human cases there
will be and the greater the risk H5N1 might mutate into a form
that could pass from person to person.
    If such a mutation occurs, it could spark a pandemic in
which millions could die.
    Globally, the virus has killed at least 103 people since
2003, the majority in Asia where many people live side-by-side
poultry. For the moment, it remains hard to catch from birds.
    In Indonesia, most bird flu cases in humans have been in or
around Jakarta. But the virus has been detected among poultry
in about two-thirds of the country's 33 provinces.
    HOSTILITY
    A big stumbling block is opposition to the control campaign
from villagers.
    "People get hostile sometimes. Some even hide their
chickens, which is silly because we can still hear the noise,"
said Sri the veterinarian.
    Despite a 30 billion rupiah ($3.3 million) scheme to cull
fowl within a kilometre radius from the point where the virus
is found, some workers are afraid to kill the birds as there is
no legal apparatus to act freely.
    Moreover, there is no monitoring system as in Thailand to
alert authorities in case of a suspected outbreak.
    In Thailand, the government has tagged its bird flu
monitoring efforts onto a nationwide network of 800,000 health
volunteers, set up decades ago as a first line of defence
against ailments such as diarrhoea, tuberculosis and
chickenpox.
    With each volunteer assigned to monitor between 10 and 20
households in Thailand, as well as educate them about the risks
and symptoms of bird flu, officials are confident any outbreak
in either poultry or humans will not go unnoticed for long.
    "If a chicken dies unusually, we will know about it within
the day," said 58-year-old Manop Sungyont, who has been a
health volunteer for 29 years in Suphan Buri province, 100 km
(60 miles) northwest of Bangkok.
    In the event of a possible outbreak, the likes of Manop
pass the information up a command chain to either animal or
human health officials, triggering the swift arrival of expert
teams to collect samples, treat victims or start culling.
  (Additional reporting by Ed Cropley in Bangkok and Diyan
Jarri in Jakarta)

REUTERS

221109 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

Afghanistan begins bird flu cull

KABUL, March 22 (Reuters) - Afghan workers in protective
suits and masks fanned out through a Kabul neighbourhood of
low, mud-brick homes on Wednesday, rounding up chickens and
spraying disinfectant, hoping to stamp out the H5N1 birdflu
virus.
    The H5N1 virus was confirmed in chickens in the capital and
an eastern province last week and is assumed to have spread to
at least three other provinces, officials said.
    The cull was delayed for several days while impoverished
Afghanistan tried to find protective suits for the teams.
Eventually, the U.S. military provided enough to get going.
    "Two cases were confirmed in this village, some chickens
already died here, some pigeons also died here," Azizullah
Osmani, chief of the Agriculture Ministry's veterinary
department, told reporters as the cull was launched.
    Bird flu has killed 103 people since late 2003, most of
them in Asia.
    Although difficult for humans to catch, experts fear the
virus could mutate into a form that passes easily between
people and trigger a pandemic that could kill millions.
    There have been no human cases in Afghanistan but there is
concern that, with veterinary and health sectors still
recovering from decades of conflict, the country could struggle
to contain an outbreak.
    Many Afghan chicken farmers and traders are illiterate and
have little knowledge of the disease. Authorities have yet to
produce much public information on the danger.
    Osmani said that as well as collecting and culling all
chickens in the area, pens and yards were being sprayed with
disinfectant.
    Teams would monitor a zone 5-10 km (3-6 miles) from the
site of the cull, he said, and if sick chickens were found, the
process would be repeated there.
    Culls would be conducted in at least three other areas of
Kabul province, he said.
    Residents of the neighbourhood in the west of Kabul, where
many people keep a few chickens in back yards, appeared
resigned to losing their birds.
    One man, Mohammad Ibrahim, said his 20 chickens had all
suddenly died as had a cat that ate one of the carcasses.
    Officials have said it will be important to compensate
people whose chickens are culled.
    Afghanistan's poultry industry was decimated by several
years of drought up to 2005 and is small-scale with only an
estimated 12 million chickens in the country.

REUTERS

221206 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

H5N1 bird flu spreads to Gaza Strip - official

RAMALLAH, West Bank, March 22 (Reuters) - The deadly H5N1
strain of bird flu which struck Israel last week has spread to
the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian agriculture official said on
Wednesday.
    The official offered few other details about the outbreak
except that the virus was detected in areas close to the Israeli
border. The H5N1 virus has also been detected in neighbouring
Egypt.
    Israel has been culling hundreds of thousands of turkeys and
chickens after an outbreak of the deadly avian virus at several
farms near the Gaza Strip.
    The Palestinian Authority on Tuesday declared a state of
emergency in hope of preventing the spread of the virus.
    The virus has rippled out from Asia to the Middle East,
Europe and Africa in recent months, with migratory birds seen as
the main culprits in spreading bird flu.
    Experts fear the virus will mutate into a form that passes
easily from person to person, sparking a pandemic in which
millions could die and which could cripple the global economy.
    Bird flu can infect people who come into close contact with
infected poultry and has killed nearly 100 people since late
2003.
    Egypt reported a fourth suspected case of bird flu in humans
on Tuesday.
    Israeli officials have said there have been no cases of
humans contracting the virus in Israel.

221344 Mrz 06

ENDOFMSG

[kyselak]

New H5N1 bird flu case found in Romania
    
BUCHAREST, March 22, 2006 (AFP) - Twelve new cases of the
potentially deadly H5N1 bird flu virus have been confirmed in
domestic poultry in a village near Bucharest, the local veterinary
health authority said Wednesday.
    The village, Magurele, 15 kilometers (nine miles) from
Bucharest, was put under quarantine and authorities began culling
over 1,000 poultry Wednesday as a result, it added.
    "Disinfection filters were placed at the entrance and exit of
Magurele and residents are forbidden from leaving the village for a
period of two to three weeks," local veterinary health authority
chief Valentin Viocu told AFP.
    "It is necessary to respect the quarantine to prevent the virus
from spreading towards Bucharest," he added.
    The H5N1 virus has been found in some 50 villages in Romania,
making it one of the European countries most affected by the
disease.
    lc-ssw/msa/smc
    
AFP 221440 GMT MAR 06

[bina]

the avian flu in israel was apparently spread by  sub cntractor that provides services to the turkey coop industry;

gaza chicken growers refuse to destroy any chickens until they actually get money in their hands (pretty dumb of them id say since they can die just like us - my own comment; bina)

and most people in gaza raise chickens like in issaan thailand: running loose in the yard, crowded conditions and 'primitive' hygiene methods...

new case of turkeys in moshav bekaa (in the jordan valley)....

wait and see....