New bird flu outbreak confirmed in hens in northeastern Thailand

[AlaskaDenise]

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/01/23/asia/AS-GEN-Thailand-Bird-Flu.php

BANGKOK, Thailand: A fresh outbreak of virulent bird flu has been found in hens in northeastern Thailand, livestock officials said Tuesday.

The outbreak of the H5N1 virus was confirmed by laboratory tests after the deaths of about 200 chickens were reported in Nong Khai province last week, said Nirand Uaebumrungsut, a veterinarian with the Agriculture Ministry's Department of Livestock Development.

Last week, livestock officials reported the country's first outbreak in almost six months of H5N1, in ducks in the northern Thai province of Phitsanulok.

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[AlaskaDenise]

Re: New bird flu outbreak confirmed in hens in northeastern Thailand

http://www.bangkokpost.com/breaking_news/breakingnews.php?id=116246

Thailand's second bird flu case confirmed

(TNA) - Laboratory tests have confirmed that the avian flu H5N1 virus was found in a poultry farm in Si Chiang Mai district of Nong Khai province where the suspicious deaths of more than 200 chickens were reported last week, according to a senior official.

Livestock Development Department director-general Pirom Srichan said the district has been declared an outbreak area with round-the-clock monitoring to prevent the illegal movement of poultry.

Strict measures have been imposed since 236 chickens were found dead last Saturday. Local livestock officials ordered mass cullings of the remaining almost 2,000 egg-bearing chickens immediately. The latest lab tests found the H5N1 virus in some chicken carcasses, Mr Pirom said.

Si Chiang Mai is the second area where the avian flu virus was found in a week after the Public Health Ministry's Department of Communicable Disease Control announced on January 15 that laboratory tests confirmed the outbreak of the virus after the deaths of more than 100 ducks in Plaichumpol subdistrict of Phitsanulok province in the North, the first such case in six months.

The Public Health Ministry ordered its staff and community health volunteers to increase measures to curb the outbreak and prevent its spread to humans.

There have been 25 bird flu patients in Thailand since the most recent outbreak here in 2004, of which 17 patients died of infection with the H5N1 virus.

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