Bird Flu Going to East Africa

[Intruder]

This is bad news for the Horn of Africa especially for people living south of Somaliland where there will be no efforts to isolate and fight this disease. Maybe southern Somalis want to offer chicken to all of their warlords to break the 15 years and counting stalemate.
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Bird Flu Going to East Africa, United Nations Officials Fear


By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
Published: October 20, 2005

ROME, Oct. 19 - As bird culls to control probable new outbreaks of avian flu started on farms in Russia and Macedonia on Wednesday, United Nations officials here warned that their far larger concern was that the virus was on its way to East Africa, where the disease could be nearly impossible to control.

As bird flu has jumped this year from Southeast Asia to China, Russia, Kazakhstan and - more recently - into the Balkan region of Europe, scientists have become somewhat belatedly convinced that wild migratory birds are one of the main carriers of the H5N1 strain of avian influenza.

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More Coverage on Avian Influenza Although there is widespread anxiety about the arrival of bird flu in Europe - European Union health ministers will convene a special session on Thursday to discuss the problem - the next stops on bird migratory paths are not in Western Europe, but in the Middle East, North Africa and East Africa, United Nations officials here say.

Countries and farmers in these parts of the world, particularly in East Africa, are completely unprepared, lacking the money and the scientific infrastructure to control outbreaks of the virus, the United Nations officials said.

"One of our major concerns is now the potential spread of avian influenza through migratory birds to north and eastern Africa," said Dr. Joseph Domenech, chief veterinary officer at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, which monitors the flu's spread in animals.

If the disease touches down there, it could become widespread in the environment and on farms before it is even detected, he said.

Also, because in poorer African nations people live in proximity with animals, such a situation would provide a dangerous crucible for the mixing of the bird and human viruses, vastly increasing the risk that the avian virus could gain the ability to readily spread among humans.

"The close proximity between people and animals and insufficient surveillance and disease control capability in eastern African countries create an ideal breeding ground for the virus," Dr. Domenech said.

While the H5N1 strain does not readily infect humans or spread between them, scientists fear that it could acquire that ability through biological mixing processes by which viruses can exchange genes if they are close together. If the H5N1 strain was capable of spreading from human to human, they say, it could be the source of a human flu pandemic.

In developed nations, bird flu outbreaks are controlled by aggressive public health measures. Once the virus is suspected - usually signaled by unusual bird deaths - it is then stamped out by preventive culls and quarantines, even before its presence is confirmed. In Macedonia, for example, health authorities were killing 10,000 birds in a small southern village today as they waited for tests in Britain, to confirm that the H5N1 strain was involved. Another possible outbreak was reported in the Tula region in Russian. In the first large bird flu outbreak, in Hong Kong in 1997, one million birds were killed in a day to stop the disease.

But such a procedure, which is extremely effective at controlling bird flu, would be difficult in Africa, United Nations officials said. Farmers have to report suspicious deaths quickly to health authorities, who need to be poised for immediate investigation and killing.

Mandatory culls are problematic in poor countries, where a family's chickens are often not just a commercial product, but also a crucial source of food.

"In birds this is a disease of biblical proportions and it is difficult to control in a setting where people depend on poultry as a major source of protein for growing children," said Dr. Mike Ryan, director of surveillance and response at the World Health Organization in Geneva.

The deadly strain of avian influenza is widespread in Southeast Asia. But compliance with culls has been sometimes difficult in poorer areas. Poor farmers may choose not to report deaths for fear of losing their birds. Worse, they may slaughter sick birds before health authorities confiscate them, to eat the birds or to sell them at local markets.

Eating meat from birds infected with the virus is not dangerous, because it is not a food-borne illness and dies with cooking. But touching the birds may infect humans.

[Rightwing]

Bro. Luckily I have had one poultry in "ERIGAVO"and has been closed.....all my birds were burned..
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LE JUSTICIER

[QansaGabeyle]

Wax kasta is about qabiil for this dude. Allah haka badbaadiyo dadkeena cuduradaan lagu talaalayo/beerayo afrika.

[Intruder]

Qansa,
Where is the Qabiil part in this post? This disease will be devastating unless there is a governmental organized method of deal with it. The fact that you live in a political dysfunctional world will exasperate your plight and I am not jumping in jubilation of that is what you are trying to say.

[Otali]

it is not yet time. When Big Pharma decides to mutate the virus to human-to-human then worry, not they will just keep it restricted to bleeding the poultry sector.
Otali

[Ducaale004]

"In developed nations, bird flu outbreaks are controlled by aggressive public health measures. Once the virus is suspected - usually signaled by unusual bird deaths - it is then stamped out by preventive culls and quarantines, even before its presence is confirmed. In Macedonia, for example, health authorities were killing 10,000 birds in a small southern village today as they waited for tests in Britain, to confirm that the H5N1 strain was involved. Another possible outbreak was reported in the Tula region in Russian. In the first large bird flu outbreak, in Hong Kong in 1997, one million birds were killed in a day to stop the disease."

To this effect, do we have to wipe out all the birds in Somalia as the best quarantine .

[Intruder]

Duufle,
Of all Somalis, you probably have to be the most concern, so yes, that has to be done.

[Mad_Dog206]

[quote]especially for people living south of Somaliland where there will be no efforts to isolate and fight this disease.[/quote]


Somaliland the UNITED STATES OF THE HORN OF AFRICA ma ahanoo?


somebody seriously needs to take a trip back to his baadiye and remote corners..

[Intruder]

Do not laugh too hard Saxib, your uncle Afbijo has been humiliated so bad I doubt he has the necessary logistics to round up few sick chickens to incinerate.

[Mad_Dog206]

u must still be in ur "waqoyi/konfur" ignorance if u actually bring up af-biijo's name wit a mareexaan


p.s. u r learnin somali huh? yaa ku baray? the lil bois u harass?

i'm jokin dude

[Steeler [Crawler2]]

Otali
Anyone ever tell you you're nuts?

[gobdoon]

Inter-pussy,HOYADA BIRD FLU DISHAY.

[B00]

This bird flu is it contaminating all bird species in gerenal ???? Or specific breeds ????