Poultry business in bird flu-hit India takes a dip
by Bilal Butt/Sameer Desai

     New Delhi/Srinagar/Pune: As bird flu maintained its relentless march across the globe with Malaysia and Hungary the latest countries to report outbreaks, the poultry owners in parts of India are in panic as officials began a drive to cull poultry at the country's first outbreak of bird flu. India's Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss said on Monday that the situation was "under control" and there were no human cases of avian flu in the country despite fears at the weekend that a farmer had succumbed to the disease. However, all eyes are on the test results of eight people quarantined in western Navapur hospital with flu-like symptoms. The reports are expected on Wednesday.

     Poultry owners fear severe business loss due to the flaring of the news that the chickens might be affected. In northern Srinagar, the animal husbandry department has undertaken a strict vigilance of the chickens even as officials said that a ban has been imposed on imports. "The poultry movement within the state is under strict vigilance. We have a quarantine post from where we are taking samples which we are sending for tests," said F.A. Kaloo, Deputy Director, Animal Husbandry, Jammu and Kashmir government. The ban has been imposed in the state for 10 days after which the situation will be reviewed. "There is a panic that Bird flu has affected Jammu and Kashmir and so people have stopped having chicken. The business is going to be severely affected," said Mushtaq Ahmed, a poultry owner from the Kashmir valley.

    On Monday, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka banned poultry from India as Bangladesh said it had ordered a high alert along its porous border with India to prevent any poultry smuggling. In Pune, poultry owners said the ban on exports would lead to huge losses. "The exports have been banned to countries like Pakistan, Sri Lanka which should not have been done," said Hanif Sheikh, a poultry owner. Meanwhile, officials in the remote district of Nandurbar in western Maharashtra state launched door-to-door checks for people with fever, and continued a mass cull of up to half a million birds. So far, India has reported no case of human avian influenza whose initial symptoms include cold, cough and fever. However, laboratory reports of eight people quarantined were awaited to conclusively rule out infection. India, known for its poor healthcare system, is testing dozens of people for avian flu after 50,000 birds died in Maharashtra and tests on some fowl last week showed H5N1. Some hotels and domestic airlines said they were dropping chicken and eggs from the menu and the poultry industry said prices were down almost 40 percent with buyers staying away. The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Monday that mutations in the H5N1 virus are seemingly making it more deadly in chickens and more resistant in the environment but without yet increasing the threat to humans. More than 200 million birds across Asia, parts of the Middle East, Europe and Africa have died of the virus or been culled.

Chicken culling likely to end today as poultry sales drop

     New Delhi/Navapur: The Central Government said that the culling of chickens might end today. "The responsibility given to the animal husbandry department to destroy the chickens might be over by today. That is what I hope," Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar said here today. Earlier, the Minister had said that the media should not create disproportionate hype about the issue as it might severely affect the rural economy. Sales of poultry products have already fallen 25 to 30 percent in the country since an outbreak of bird flu was first reported in Maharashtra at the weekend, an industry official said. However, Animal Husbandry Secretary PMA Hakeem, said that India is ready to contain and eliminate the spread of the virus. "The disease can spread from poultry to animals particularly to pigs, equines and then it can go to any animal including human. So, people who are closely working with poultry can get infection otherwise they cannot. People with human influenza like H6 or so, such person if he handles birds hybridisation will take place maximum," said Hakeem. So far, there are no confirmed human cases but thousands of people have been tested just in case. Laboratory reports on the first group of people quarantined were expected late on Wednesday. The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Monday that mutations in the H5N1 virus were seemingly making it more deadly in chickens and more resistant in the environment, but without yet increasing the threat to humans. But scientists said the virus has already developed the ability to infect more species of animals and the fear is H5N1 could eventually mutate to pass easily from human to human. In India, 10 people have been quarantined as officials scrambled to contain a major outbreak of bird flu in poultry before it took hold here. At least 15 nations have reported outbreaks in birds this month, an indication that the virus, which has killed more than 90 people, is spreading faster.

      Around 80,000 birds are expected to be culled today in addition to about 1,13,000 chickens which were culled till Monday in Navapur district of Maharashtra. The culled birds are buried in pits with lime, potassium permanganate and ordinary salt for creating aseptic conditons, sources said. The country's poultry product exporters, hit by the first cases of bird flu, fear major losses unless the government acts immediately to reassure importing nations over food safety. The All India Poultry Products Exporters' Association had yesterday said that exporters had halted sales after the outbreak because they were concerned that importing countries might not accept consignments. Industry sources said the losses could amount to 500 million rupees (11.26 million dollars). "The business has been affected severely. Those that we were selling for 175 rupees (about 4 dollars) now, we are selling them at meagre 45 (about one dollar) rupees," said Riaz, a chicken shop owner in Mumbai. In a sign of what could follow, neighbours Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal and some gulf countries have already banned poultry products from India. However, Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss had said that the situation was "under control" and there were no human cases of avian flu in the country despite fears at the weekend that a farmer had succumbed to the disease. Now, all eyes are on the test results of eight people quarantined in Navapur hospital with flu-like symptoms. The reports are expected on Wednesday. Meanwhile, health officials in the remote district of Nandurbar in Maharashtra launched a door-to-door check for people with fever after 50,000 birds died and tests on some fowl showed the H5N1 strain as the cause of death. Poultry owners fear severe business loss due to the flaring of the news that the chickens might be affected. India exports poultry products valued at close to three billion rupees every year, out of which eggs account for more than two- thirds, mainly to the Middle East, Africa, the European Union and Japan.

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