February 7, 2007
Headless chickens
Europe’s vets are more worried than they admit publicly about the outbreak of bird flu in the UK. Until now, there has been a familiar pattern. Wild migratory birds start dropping out of the sky, having brought the virus from Asia, and then their domestic farm cousins start keeling over too.
However, despite extensive searches around the Bernard Matthews turkey farm on the east coast of England, no infected wild birds have been found. There are some sea gulls, which can carry the disease without succumbing to it. Nor are there infections on nearby farms. Of course this could happen any time.
But it’s a long way from Hungary, where the same virus has been found among geese, and Hungary is a long way from the sea. Is there another explanation?
Senior European officials are perplexed. The farm of 159,000 birds was low-risk. They were kept indoors away from wild birds, nor was there water near where they might gather. They have ruled out cross-contamination by an employee who may have travelled from Hungary, where Bernard Matthews also has plants.
"It’s very strange," said one. "All the other outbreaks have been spread by wild birds. There are wild birds such as swans that can carry the virus and remain healthy.”
However, he said that imported eggs or even an exposed human’s clothing could have carried the virus. “It is all hypothetical,” he said. "We are learning more about this disease all the time.
Caroline Lucas, a Green MEP who investigated the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak in the UK, has another explanation. She claims that factory farming methods responsible for the spread of mad cow disease in the 1990s could be to blame.
I don’t know if she has the answer but it is surely worth debating, rather than dismissing as UK junior farm minister Ben Bradshaw did.
Make up your own mind by reading Lucas’ report.
It is a mistake to keep thousands of birds in cramped warm conditions perfect for virus mutation and infection, she says. As a precautionary measure the EU should immediately halt all imports and exports of live poultry and hatching eggs.
Thousand of birds in cramped conditions are open to all manners of contamination. The refence to imported eggs could they haved carried the virus were they used to breed ??? we should stop all these cheap imports of chicken because the conditions they are kept in overseas is very poor in many cases .
Posted by: colina | February 7th, 2007 at 12:48 pm | Report this comment