Bird flu: 'culling birds will not work'

[Guest guest]

http://www.scidev.net/News/index.cfm?fuseaction=readNews & itemid=2047 & language=1

 

Bird flu: 'culling birds will not work'

 

14 April 2005

Source: Nature

 

Mass culling of poultry to limit the spread of bird flu is not an

acceptable method of control, said the UN Food and Agriculture

Organization and the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) at

a meeting in Paris, France, last week (7-8 April).

 

Instead, the two organisations are urging governments and farmers

to vaccinate birds against the disease. Their previous calls for

vaccination were not as strong as this one.

 

The insistence follows a realisation that killing large numbers of

birds is unlikely to eliminate the lethal H5N1 bird flu virus. The

virus is widespread in wild and domestic bird populations, meaning

it will continue to re-emerge no matter how many birds are killed.

 

The organisations say that " for ethical, ecological and economical

reasons " , culling should no longer be used as a primary means of

control.

 

Previously, some Asian governments preferred culling because they

feared that vaccinating birds would merely eliminate symptoms,

allowing the virus to spread undetected.

 

Participants in the Paris meeting recognised that many countries

are not able to fund a vaccination programme. They called for

US$100-120 million in aid over three to five years to help Asian

countries with this.