MSNBC Bird flu recurs in Thailand, Tibet also hit

[Guest guest]

>Bird flu recurs in Thailand, Tibet also hit

>Thailand's hopes of following Japan in declaring

>a swift end to its huge bird flu crisis were

>dashed Monday as the virus that has killed 20

>Asians reappeared in eight areas where it had

>been thought vanquished.

>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4277363/

>

 

 

AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon

South Korean pedestrians eat free chicken on a

street in Seoul Monday. South Korea's poultry

industry groups have offered to pay $1.72 million

insurance to anyone who gets bird flu from

home-bred poultry.

 

Updated: 1:45 p.m. ET Feb. 16, 2004

 

BANGKOK, Thailand - Thailand's hopes of following

Japan in declaring a swift end to its huge bird

flu crisis were dashed Monday as the virus that

has killed 20 Asians reappeared in eight areas

where it had been thought vanquished.

 

Japan planned to declare an end to its sole

outbreak this week if no new cases were reported,

officials said, and Thailand had hoped to follow

suit by the end of this month despite warnings

from U.N. health experts that it was being

premature.

 

But Deputy Agriculture Minister Newin Chidchop

told reporters the H5N1 virus had been found in

fighting cocks in areas of eight provinces where

mass slaughters were carried out and in ducks in

one not struck by the first wave of infections.

 

" We have found 14 spots in nine provinces, " he said.

 

The infected fighting cocks -- valuable birds

some owners were accused of hiding -- were found

in former " red zones " where the government had

ordered the slaughter of poultry within a

three-mile radius of an outbreak, he said.

 

An animal welfare organization said in London

Monday that chickens were being set on fire or

buried alive across East Asia as countries

struggle to contain the outbreak.

 

Thailand has slaughtered 30 million birds, about

the same number as Vietnam, where at least 14

people have died of bird flu and which reported

two more cases of the disease.

 

" The slaughter of millions of chickens by burying

them alive is an inhumane and totally

unacceptable method of slaughter and should be

stopped immediately, " said Leah Garces, head of

campaigns at the World Society for the Protection

of Animals.

 

Thailand, where six people have died after

catching the highly infectious virus from sick

poultry, had been warned by the World Health

Organization that it was in too much of a rush to

declare the crisis ended.

 

It said some countries appeared to be putting

business ahead of human health, a charge Thailand

said could not be leveled at it despite having

the world's fourth largest chicken export

industry which earns more than $1 billion a year.

 

As Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra assured

worried Thais the crisis would be over soon, the

WHO and the U.N. Food and Agriculture

Organization emphasized how difficult it was to

stamp out the virus, thought to be spread by

migrating birds.

 

It could take months, even a couple of years, to

be sure the H5N1 virus was no longer a threat,

the FAO said.

 

" Based on our experience in Vietnam and Thailand,

we still have concerns that the outbreak is not

going to be contained in the next one or two

months, " Kumara Rai, of the WHO's Southeast Asia

office said in New Delhi.

 

Two new cases

Thailand had promised to be meticulous in

ensuring the eradication of the virus and it was

a second set of tests in former " red zones " which

discovered the bug was still present.

 

A 15-year-old boy tested positive for the disease

and was being treated at a hospital in the

northern province of Thanh Hoa while a

22-year-old man was confirmed as having the

disease and was in hospital in Ho Chi Minh City

in the south.

 

The virus, which has struck in eight Asian

nations, is still spreading. Even Tibet's

towering mountains and thin air haven't kept it

out.

 

China's Ministry of Agriculture said the H5N1

avian flu virus had been found in Lhasa, the

Himalayan region's capital, about 11,800 ft above

sea level.

 

That news came as an emergency meeting of health

and agricultural officials from seven South Asian

nations, and U.N. experts from Bangkok,

reaffirmed a ban on import of poultry groups and

exotic pet birds in a bid to prevent an outbreak.

 

Participants vowed to boost cooperation and

declared poultry and poultry products from the

region safe for human consumption.

 

Six of the seven nations -- Bangladesh, Bhutan,

India, the Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka -- have

no reported cases of bird flu so far. But

officials said after the meeting in New Delhi

they " wanted to be very, very cautious as they

could be caught unawares " after the crisis in the

neighborhood.

 

The seventh country, Pakistan, like Taiwan and

three states in the United States, has been

struck by a milder strain of avian flu that

cannot cross the species barrier into humans.

 

So far, the H5N1 virus has not proved its ability

to pass from human to human, although the WHO

says it cannot absolutely rule out that

possibility in one Vietnamese case.

 

Experts say H5N1 could attain that ability if it

got into a person incubating a human flu virus,

allowing it to mutate into a strain that could

sweep through people with no immunity to it.

 

That, they say, is a very remote possibility, but

one which necessitates a rigorous war to

eradicate the virus.

 

There were fears, quashed quickly by the FAO, the

virus had got into pigs in Vietnam, which could

accelerate the process of mutation into a strain

that might cause a human pandemic.

 

But a clouded leopard died of the H5N1 virus on

Jan. 27 at Kaokiew Zoo, 40 miles east of Bangkok.

A tiger at the same zoo was recovering from the

virus, Thailand said Monday.

 

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