Bird flu detected in France and Germany

By Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa Feb 25, 2006, 16:21 GMT

The deadly H5N1 bird flu virus was present on dead turkeys found on a farm in the southeast of France, the French Farm Ministry confirmed early Saturday, while outbreaks have been reported in several states in Germany.

Initial analyses on the French birds on Friday detected the H5 virus, but further tests were necessary to determine if the turkeys carried the H5N1 viral strain responsible for the deaths of more than 90 people in Asia and Turkey.

The later test confirmed the first infection on a farm in the European Union. France reported two cases of bird flu in wild ducks last week.

Some 400 dead birds were found on the farm in Versailleux in the region of Ain, and the rest of the approximately 11,000 turkeys on the site were immediately put down. Five employees of the farm were receiving treatment to prevent illness.

The farm is some 80 kilometres from where one of the wild ducks carrying the H5N1 virus was found. In a press statement, the French Poultry Federation said Friday that the turkeys could have been infected by the droppings from the duck.

A vaccination programme approved by the EU this week will begin in France, focussing on millions of birds.

Later Saturday French President Jacques Chirac stressed that there is no danger from eating poultry and eggs, saying that experts have repeatedly said that the virus is destroyed by cooking.

France is Europe's largest poultry producer.

The H5N1 virus can be caught by humans who handle infected birds, but there has been no case of it passing from one person to another. Health officials fear the virus could mutate into one that could pass from person to person.

Meanwhile in Germany the states of Brandenburg, Schleswig- Holstein, Baden-Wuerttemberg and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania have all reported bird flu cases.

A duck found February 15 on Lake Constance, in sight of the Austrian and Swiss Alps, had the H5N1 strain of the virus, Agriculture Minister Peter Hauk said Saturday.

The virus found is the most virulent sort, German animal infection specialists said Saturday.

With Germany still in the grip of winter, scientists said it was plainer than ever that the virus had not just arrived with migratory birds, but had been present since last year. The dead duck was a type that lives on the shore of Lake Constance all year round.

The effort now is to stop the virus spreading from wild to domestic birds.

In Brandenburg two dead birds were found to be infected with the virus, a spokesman for the agriculture ministry said. Further tests would be required to determine whether the virus was the dangerous Asia type.

Earlier this month, wild birds were found on Germany's northern coast with the same illness.

Crisis staffs were meeting Saturday morning in the agriculture ministry and at Lake Constance while helicopters and water police searched the lakeside for more dead birds.

Meanwhile the number of infected wild birds in the northern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania reached 114 Saturday. Troops and helpers were continuing to search for dead birds on the Baltic Sea island of Ruegen.

President of the German Farmers Association Gerd Sonnleitner was at pains to reassure German consumers about the safety of poultry and eggs.

'The consumer always has the highest possible protection,' he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.