Bird flu sounds alarm again in West Bengal, India

NI Wire

New Delhi

Mon, 14 Jan 2008: 

The health department has sounded an alert of possible bird flu in Birbhum district of West Bengal with reports of death of thousands of chickens. Reports of death of chickens are also coming from some parts of the West Bengal.

The Animal Husbandry Department has been constantly monitoring the cases and alth officials are taking note of the health condition of the people in the affected villages.

Though there is no confirmation of the bird flu from the veterinary department but the administration doesn’t want to leave any chance.

Meanwhile, as per the initial reports of Animal Husbandry Department of Bhopal the cases are though indicating towards bird influenza but no confirmation yet for the deadly H5N1 virus. There are several rounds of testing needs to be done before the final report.

The state authority has initiated culling process in villages where the numbers of infected birds are increasing rapidly. The locals are directed not to buy or sell chickens and report if they experience any kind of fever or queasiness.

Earlier in the year 2006, a massive level of bird flu cases were reported in states like Manipur, Madhya Pradesh, Maharastra and some parts of Gujarat which forced the authority and locals to slay thousands of chickens. However, no human loss was reported in that period but this time especially with the reports of one person’s death due to bird flu in China and increasing outbreak in Indonesia has sounded a serious alert tone.

Meanwhile, the central government taking note of the earnestness of the situation has sent a team from the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) to collect detailed report and suggest appropriate steps.

WHO Reports
As per the reports of the World Health Organisation (WHO) the poultry farms of India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Indonesia, and Thailand are timely get affected with avian influenza. However, only Thailand, Indonesia and Myanmar are reported to be hit with human cases in recent times.

In September 2006, there was one case of human death reported in Thailand.

Recent case
Indonesian Health Ministry has confirmed a death of 32-year old woman due to bird flu. With this the total number of death due to avian influenza has touched the mark of 95 in Indonesia only. After a couple of laboratory tests the death was confirmed owing to H5N1 bird flu virus, the deadly one.