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  • #31
    Re: Another Nigerian state closes farm following suspected bird flu

    Originally posted by niman
    <TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=3 width="98%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=bbb1 vAlign=center align=middle height=27>http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/20...nt_4163760.htm
    Another Nigerian state closes farm following suspected bird flu

    </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="98%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD align=middle bgColor=#333333 height=1></TD></TR><TR><TD class=g10 align=middle height=21>www.chinaview.cn 2006-02-11 03:56:54</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
    <TABLE class=txt_zw cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="98%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>LAGOS, Feb. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- The northern Nigerian state of Katsina has closed a farm following a suspected outbreak of bird flu, the state commissioner for agriculture, Alhaji Ali Dutsin-Ma,said on Friday.
    More than 1,100 chickens have been killed and buried to avoid the spread of the disease at the Nasiha poultry farm in the state capital Katsina, Dutsin-Ma told a news conference in Katsina.
    Previously, four farms in the northern states of Kano and Kaduna, and the central state of Plateau, have been closed after the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu was found there early this week.
    Dutsin-Ma said the area where the affected farm was located had also disinfected.
    He also stated that samples collected at the farm had already been sent to National Veterinary Institute at Vom near Plateau state capital Jos for analysis.
    Dutsin-ma said a massive enlightenment campaign on the disease would be mounted in the state so as to ensure that the problem did not spread to other areas. Enditem

    </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
    Map updated

    http://www.recombinomics.com/H5N1_Map_2006_AfricaF.html

    Comment


    • #32
      Ostriches infected??

      Nigerian policemen get ready to kill 168 ostrich allegedly infected with the avian flu at the Sambawa farms in Jaji district of Kaduna State. Nigeria struggled to contain Africa's first known outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, as officials warned it is spreading rapidly through poultry flocks in the north of the country.(AFP/File/Pius Utomi Ekpei)
      Last edited by Theresa42; August 25, 2006, 02:35 AM.
      ...when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. - Sherlock Holmes

      Comment


      • #33
        Nigeria struggles to contain bird flu

        Nigeria struggles to contain bird flu

        Nigeria struggled to contain Africa's first known outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, as officials warned it is spreading rapidly through poultry flocks in the north of the country.

        Agriculture Minister Adamu Bello met with diplomats and UN agencies to appeal for funding and technical support to help combat a virus which has killed tens of thousands of chickens and threatens humans.

        "We briefed them on the outbreak and indicated to them the kind of resource requirements that are likely to arise," he said.

        "We told them that we need facilities such as laboratories, vaccines and technical support."

        Overnight, police and agricultural officers had moved into the farm at the epicentre of the explosion of avian influenza, shot ostriches and bulldozed the charred remains of 45,000 cremated chickens into the ground.

        But there were signs that emergency measures -- which are soon to be supported by international agencies -- might be coming too late, one month after poultry started falling victim to what was then a mystery infection.

        A senior official from the northern state of Kano, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP that 16 farms in his area were now thought to be infected by bird flu and that 100,000 chickens had died.

        Bello said in Abuja that so far only four farms -- two in Kano State, one near Kaduna and one 200 kilometres (125 miles) away in Plateau State in Nigeria's central highlands -- had been formally identified as infected.

        But a farmer's representative said the outbreak was spreading fast.
        "We have 30 farms that have been affected, and we're still counting," said Auwalu Haruna, head of the Kano Poultry Farmers' Association.


        In neighbouring Kaduna State, zonal agriculture director Sa'idu Baba Chori said that so far only one farm had been confirmed to be affected, but said a nearby household where two children had fallen ill was being investigated.

        "It's a house where they raise turkey, geese and chickens," he said.
        Shortly after birds started dying in the house, the owner's two children began coughing up blood, officials said. Tests are being carried out to see if they have bird flu, Chori said, "but it's too early to tell".


        In Paris, the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) said tests had confirmed that the Nigerian outbreak was from the same strain of bird flu as had proved fatal to humans in Turkey and China.

        "It has come from these countries and it is very very unlikely that it has come through trade, and very likely that it has been through migratory birds," said Alex Thiermann, special advisor to the director-general of the OIE.

        The H5N1 strain can pass from birds to humans -- usually farmers or traders in direct contact with live animals -- and has already killed 89 people, mainly in Asia, since it emerged in Hong Kong in 1997.

        However if it mutates into a form transmissible between people it could cause a pandemic killing tens of millions, experts warn.

        "The H5N1 virus now confirmed in Nigeria poses a risk to human health and livelihood," World Health Organisation (WHO) Director General Lee Jong-wook said, in a statement.

        "If the H5N1 virus changes to allow it to pass easily from person to person, and if it goes unchecked, this could trigger an influenza pandemic," he said.

        "H5N1 is spreading rapidly across the world. All countries must take measures to protect human health against avian flu and prepare for a pandemic."

        The WHO said it was sending a seven-member team of experts this weekend to Nigeria and would use a mass polio vaccination beginning Saturday to help detect possible human cases of bird flu.

        Two other UN bodies, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the World Organisation for Animal Health, called on Nigerian authorities to immediately close down poultry markets.

        The agencies said they would also send a joint mission to Nigeria within 48 hours, to assess the situation and advise of further emergency measures.

        "The movement of poultry should be stopped immediately to contain the disease. People should not import or trade livestock or livestock products," they said in a joint statement.

        They said Nigeria's neighbours Benin, Cameroon, Chad, Ghana, Niger and Togo should increase surveillance and veterinary staff tighten border inspections.

        The UN bodies welcomed emergency measures already put in place by Nigeria in the affected areas, but said controls "need to be intensified, applying standard procedures recommended by FAO and OIE guidelines."

        http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060211...a_060210194803
        ...when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. - Sherlock Holmes

        Comment


        • #34
          Bird flu reaches Africa + 'dead birds don't fly' (again)

          Published online: 9 February 2006

          Bird flu reaches Africa
          Experts fear poverty and lack of infrastructure may spread disease.

          Declan Butler

          The H5NI avian flu virus has broken out in battery farms of poultry in Nigeria; it's the first time the disease has been reported in Africa.

          H5N1 spread from birds in Asia to flocks in Eurasia last summer. Its appearance in Africa marks a massive leap in the geographical extension of the virus's range

          The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a statement warning that unless it is strictly controlled, H5N1 can easily become endemic in poultry. They add that experience shows that wherever there is disease in poultry, there is inevitably the risk of human cases. That risk is high in Nigeria, and in many parts of Africa, because backyard poultry farms are common.

          The arrival of H5N1 in Africa is a scenario experts have long dreaded, as poverty and lack of infrastructure make control much more difficult. Detection is hard enough in richer countries, experts note. Recent outbreaks in poultry in Turkey were detected and reported only after surveillance was stepped up following the occurrence of human cases.

          Few African countries have surveillance systems for H5N1. The outbreak in Jaji village in the northern Kaduna state of Nigeria, which killed 40,000 battery chickens, in fact began on 10 January, but was only reported to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) in the first week of February. The owner of the farm, which also houses ostriches and geese, initially treated the sick flocks with antibiotics. These drugs are useless against viral infections.

          On the wing?

          It is still unclear whether the new outbreak has been caused by virus carried by migratory birds from Eurasia, or by the trade and movement of poultry or poultry products, says Joseph Domenech, the chief veterinary officer of the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).

          Circumstantial evidence points to Nigeria being a destination of several migrant birds from Eurasia. But migratory birds have been flying into Africa from Eurasia for much of the autumn, so if they are to blame, it is odd that many more outbreaks have not been seen across the vast swathes of Africa where they overwinter (see 'Migration threatens to send flu south'). In most of the cases worldwide, trade has been the agent of spread.


          Ongoing sequencing of the virus by the OIE/FAO reference laboratory for avian flu in Padova, Italy, should throw some light on the geographic origins of the strain involved. Both agencies have also dispatched a team of experts to the area, to get a better picture of the extent and spread of the disease, and to advise on control measures. Die-offs of poultry have recently been reported in the next door province of Kano.

          If the virus has spread to backyard farms, the WHO will launch public-information campaigns to warn of high-risk behaviours, including the slaughtering or butchering of diseased birds. But such an operation will face challenges such as poor literacy and difficulty in distributing information.

          Comment


          • #35
            Nigeria starts testing people for bird flu: WHO

            Nigeria starts testing people for bird flu: WHO
            Sat Feb 11, 2006 7:01 AM ET166
            By Daniel Flynn

            KANO, Nigeria (Reuters) - Nigeria has started testing people who have fallen ill close to where the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus was found, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Saturday.

            No human cases of bird flu have been reported in Africa's most populous country, where H5N1 has killed tens of thousands of poultry, but it is hard for authorities to monitor because of high mortality rates from many other diseases.

            "Our field officers are already there, in those farms and nearby. We are monitoring and taking samples. We are concerned about the possibility of a human case," said Lola Sadiq, in charge of coordinating the bird flu response at WHO headquarters in Abuja.

            "This is a tropical environment where there are lots of diseases, so we need to watch closely and take a lot of swabs. They will be tested here first and if there is any suspicion (of bird flu) they will send samples abroad," she said.

            Sadiq said the WHO had received information about two people who were feared to have contracted the disease in Kaduna state, close to Sambawa Farms where one of the poultry samples that tested positive for H5N1 came from.

            But she said there was no certainty for now and authorities wanted to avoid causing panic.

            Experts fear the H5N1 strain, which has killed at least 88 people in Asia and the Middle East since early 2003, may mutate into a form that can spread from human to human. They fear this could cause a global flu pandemic that could kill millions.

            FIRST AFRICAN OUTBREAK

            The outbreak of H5N1 in Nigeria -- its first known appearance on the continent -- has worried health experts but left almost all those in the affected areas in Kaduna, Kano and Plateau states ignorant of the danger facing them.

            H5N1 has been confirmed on four farms in the three northern states, and other farmers and villagers are reporting mass deaths of poultry.

            However, trade in live fowl is unabated in the region and people are moving chickens around in public transport as usual.

            In the countryside, farmers in normal clothes and sandals are using their bare hands to throw dead and dying chickens on fires while village children stand by to watch. They say they do not know the nature of the illness killing the birds.

            One key challenge facing authorities in the fight against bird flu is that poultry is everywhere in Nigeria -- in people's village backyards, in city streets, by the side of the road, in crowded markets, on buses.

            Chicken is a staple of the Nigerian diet and, as in much of sub-Saharan Africa, most poultry is bought live and slaughtered at home because people have no access to refrigerators.

            In rural areas, most people are far too poor to buy newspapers or television sets. In most villages there is no electricity, running water or paved road. Health services are almost non-existent.

            The government has ordered suspect birds culled and suspect farms quarantined, but the measures have not been implemented yet and on the ground there has been little sign of a concrete response from authorities.

            The government also said it would pay 250 naira ($2) for every chicken culled in the campaign against bird flu, but it has not given any details of how the scheme will work in practice.

            (Additional reporting by Estelle Shirbon in Abuja)

            Comment


            • #36
              Re: 2 more Nigerian States have H5N1

              I posted NPR articles yesterday (listen to them) that said the Nigerian H5N1 had been sequenced and the "genetic fingerprint" shows it is more than 95% similar to Turkey, Croatia, Siberia and China. I had to laugh that the unspoken message there is that recombination does occur. Paradigm shift! And that wild birds are spreading the disease.

              Comment


              • #37
                People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria




                People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria
                This Article
                Also Appears In
                Infectious Diseases/Bacteria/Viruses




                Main Category: Flu/Bird Flu/SARS News
                Article Date: 11 Feb 2006 - 15:00pm (UK)

                Two people have fallen ill with flu-like symptoms near the Sambawa Farms, Kaduna, where chickens are infected with the lethal H5N1 Bird Flu virus strain. Nigerian authorities say they are trying to establish whether these two people have been infected with the bird flu virus.

                A few days bird flu infection among chickens was confirmed in northen Nigeria, in the state of Kaduna. A couple of days later it spilled into bordering states.

                Information given out by Nigerian authorities as to exactly how many people may have bird flu like symptoms is patchy. Some say there are two people, while others say there are ?a few' suspected cases.

                An rumour that a human case of bird flu was found in the south of Nigeria. There is no confirmation on whether this is true.

                At the moment the procedure for confirming bird flu infection is as follows:

                1. A sample is taken.
                2. It is sent to a lab in Nigeria.
                3. If it tests negative, that is the end of it.
                4. It it tests positive, it is then sent abroad for confirmation.

                Bird flu has made its way from Viet Nam, in south east Asia, across the world to Nigeria, in west Africa. Africa is a vast continent. If the virus spills over into Sub-Saharan Africa, one of the poorest regions in the world with a population of 600 million people, it will be extremely difficult to monitor. Local health experts say it would be virtually impossible to ask people in Sub Saharan Africa, many of whom are facing starvation, to surrender their chickens for culling.

                People in Europe are concerned about the coming of Spring, when birds migrate from Africa to Europe (and parts of Asia).
                A thing long expected takes the form of the unexpected when at last it comes. Mark Twain

                Comment


                • #38
                  Re: 2 more Nigerian States have H5N1


                  Bird flu discovered in two more Nigerian states

                  Jeevan Vasagar in Nairobi and agencies
                  Friday February 10, 2006
                  The Guardian

                  Fears of an outbreak of bird flu in Africa grew yesterday after government officials confirmed that the deadly strain of the virus had been discovered in two more Nigerian states.The first documented case of H5N1 bird flu in Africa was reported on Wednesday at a farm in Kaduna state, in the north of Africa's most populous country. Agriculture ministry officials said yesterday the strain had been confirmed at two farms in Kano state and one in Plateau state.




                  Poultry farms across northern Nigeria were quarantined yesterday as the government gave orders to cull birds at farms where there had been suspicious deaths. It promised to compensate farmers.The World Health Organisation said last night the development was "a cause for great concern" and demanded "immediate action". Its director general, Dr Lee Jong-wook, said the outbreak meant "no country is immune to H5N1. Every country is at risk. Every country must prepare."
                  Chickens started dying in large numbers in northern Nigeria four weeks ago, raising fears that the virus could have spread across the country and possibly into neighbouring west African states before its presence was confirmed. In recent weeks the price of chicken in the markets has plummeted as farmers have rushed to sell diseased birds. No human infections have been reported in Nigeria, but 40,000 birds died at the Kaduna farm at which the virus was first reported.



                  The battery farm, which is owned by the country's sports minister, Saidu Balarabe Sambawa, had 46,000 chicken, geese and ostriches. At the farm 15 concrete hangars used as chicken pens were empty yesterday and workers said that all the birds had died about a month ago.
                  Around 20 riot police sat in the shade of trees guarding the farm, but did not prevent journalists and villagers from walking among the buildings. Foul-smelling pits were visible at the back, and about 40 ostriches wandered around in a field.
                  A team of government officials who visited the farm in search of human victims was unable to speak to its management. Aliyu Sale, one of the officials, said: "We want to find out if it's affecting people. Unfortunately we couldn't meet anybody and all the chickens have died already." The sports minister is attending the African Cup tournament in Egypt.
                  Nigeria has a poultry population of about 140m. Millions of people keep chicken in their backyards. Because they lack refrigerators, most people buy chickens live and slaughter them just before cooking - thereby increasing the risk of human infection. The WHO said: "If the virus has spread to household flocks, public information campaigns will be needed to warn populations to avoid high-risk behaviour, including slaughtering, defeathering, butchering and preparation for consumption of diseased poultry."


                  Fears of an outbreak of bird flu in Africa grew yesterday after government officials confirmed that the deadly strain of the virus had been discovered in two more Nigerian states.

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Re: People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria

                    Agreed. We are only seeing the begining of a horrific event. Many people may already or have already been ill but with poor/nil heathcare sources many will not even be tested and therfor never listed as H5N1 postive.

                    Horrible Day.
                    A thing long expected takes the form of the unexpected when at last it comes. Mark Twain

                    Comment


                    • #40
                      Re: People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria

                      They cant even control malaria and people die from simple diseases all the time. I estimate that 100,000+ have already died there, there is just no way to know, a lab in Nigeria is probably a guy with a 1940's microscope and a couple pieces of used litmus paper. Hell look at how fast aids has spread in Africa, and look how hard that is to get. I am really nervous about all of it.

                      Comment


                      • #41
                        Re: People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria

                        Not to mention the fact that they believe very strongly in witchcraft, spells and stuff like that............I'll put a spell on this sick chicken and I won't die if I eat it!!!!!

                        Comment


                        • #42
                          Human Link to Virus is Studied (Nigeria)

                          <TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=title width="100%">Human Link to Virus is Studied (Nigeria)

                          Gulf Daily News
                          http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Story...&IssueID=28329
                          </TD></TR><TR><TD class=body vAlign=top width="100%"><!--body text-->JAJI, Nigeria: Authorities in Nigeria are investigating whether a deadly bird flu strain discovered in this West African country last week has spread to humans after several people were reported ill, the health minister said yesterday.

                          Health officials are investigating "one or two cases of reported illnesses" among humans which could be due to bird flu, though none has been confirmed so far, Health Minister Eyitayo Lambo said.

                          Lambo said the investigation was being conducted in the northern state of Kaduna, where the H5N1 strain of the virus was reported for the first time in Africa last week, and the commercial capital, Lagos. He gave few details, but said he expected the probe to finish later yesterday with results released to the public today.

                          It is difficult for people to catch bird flu, and no human H5N1 cases have been recorded in Africa. But experts fear H5N1 could mutate into a strain that passes easily from human to human.

                          Authorities say at least 100,000 birds have died so far.

                          Yesterday, veterinary officials in Jaji destroyed chickens at farms suspected to have been infected with the fatal bird flu strain, slashing their necks, dumping them in pits and setting them ablaze.
                          </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

                          Comment


                          • #43
                            A Worrisome New Front (NY Times on the Nigerian situation)

                            February 12, 2006
                            News Analysis
                            A Worrisome New Front
                            By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL and DONALD G. McNEIL Jr.

                            As epidemics go, it was a relatively small outbreak: 40,000 chickens died in mid-January on a commercial poultry farm in Nigeria. No humans seemed to have been infected. But to many experts on avian flu, it was the outbreak they had been dreading for months.

                            It was the first time the fast-moving A(H5N1) virus had been reported in Africa. And while United Nations agencies are now scrambling to form medical and veterinary response and surveillance teams, scientists say its appearance there is deeply worrisome for two reasons.

                            First, the continent is ill prepared to deal with epidemics, whether human or animal. Second, the Nigerian outbreak comes only a month or two before birds begin migrating north from Africa to Europe, which has so far been largely untouched by the virus.

                            "These are horrendous developments, whether you're a human or if you're a bird," said John Oxford, a professor of virology at Queen Mary's College in London. "Everyone wondered what would happen if avian influenza came to Africa, but no one really prepared. They waited. Now it's there — and this is not the most organized continent in the world."

                            World health officials say they have not had the cooperation they needed from many poor countries, even those on the flight paths of migrating birds known to carry flu. They got lab samples weeks or months after problems began — and for that reason, they worry that the disease is already much more widespread.

                            As late as Monday, Nigerian veterinary officials were assuring the nation that the disease was not in their country. But Juan Lubroth, a senior veterinarian at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome, said in an interview that there was strong evidence that bird flu took root in Nigeria "a few months ago." While the outbreak took place on a commercial poultry farm, he said, the virus may well have been percolating for months in backyard flocks.

                            "How long has it been trickling around, with five deaths here and five deaths there, and owners would possibly not be aware of the problem?" he asked.

                            The problem of sluggish reporting is not limited to Africa. It was common in the early months of the outbreaks in Asia, in 2003. In Azerbaijan, which reported its first cases last week, bird flu was only "picked up because of international pressure to come clean," Dr. Lubroth said, adding: "We've been repeating over and over to countries that they have to be vigilant, but in most countries, it's business as usual. They say, 'Avian influenza isn't here now — we'll deal with it when it arrives.' But then it's too late."
                            Maria Cheng, a spokeswoman for the World Health Organization, said her agency suspected that there might be human cases of A(H5N1) flu in Africa, but had no way to confirm that yet.

                            "We're getting a team ready to go," she said, "but we're waiting to get the invitation from Nigeria."

                            And even when scattered United Nations teams are in place, the disease could spread faster than they can track it. The health care systems of most of the continent's 52 countries are so broken down that most are unable to vaccinate children or distribute AIDS drugs without Western financial aid and technical advice.

                            The only laboratories on the continent with licenses from the W.H.O. and the ability to run the necessary sequencing tests on flu viruses are in Egypt and South Africa, 4,000 miles apart.

                            And little is known about the spread of even regular seasonal flu, said Dr. Michael L. Perdue, a scientist with the W.H.O. influenza program in Geneva. "We get samples that South Africa takes from neighboring countries," he said, "but we know very little about central Africa."

                            Confusion about avian flu is rife in Nigeria.

                            On Monday, the chief of veterinary services in Kano State assured the country that the disease that by then had killed 60,000 chickens was avian cholera — a disease with symptoms different from those of avian flu, and caused by a bacteria, not a virus. Testing in an Italian lab determined that the disease was indeed avian flu.

                            On Wednesday, an Agence France-Presse reporter interviewing traders in the Kano markets found that the price of chickens had dropped to $2 from $6 because farmers were dumping their birds on the market before they died or were culled.

                            By Friday, The Daily Sun, a large national newspaper, was reporting under the headline "Bird Flu Scare Grips Nigeria" that government ministers were shunning chicken in favor of beef and fish at banquets, apparently unaware that cooked chicken is safe.

                            The paper also interviewed five Nigerian doctors, all of whom said there was no treatment for the disease. That is not correct, though the usual treatment, the antiviral drug Tamiflu, is expensive and in short supply.

                            Also on Friday, a BBC News reporter visited one of the northern farms where 20,000 birds had died. Although the Nigerian Health Ministry had announced that the farms were quarantined and being disinfected, he reported that basic safety measures were being ignored. Carcasses were being burned in the open, letting infectious feathers and dander spread downwind. The farm workers doing the culling wore their regular overalls and had no protective gear. Villagers were still entering the property to draw well water.

                            Northern Nigeria is one of the world's last outposts of endemic polio, in part because people in Kano were long told by local leaders that the vaccine was unsafe. The polio eradication drive going on there now could be a boon in the effort to counter avian flu.

                            Dr. David L. Heymann, who is in charge of the W.H.O. antipolio campaign, said the 300 Nigerian health workers now trained to spot paralysis cases in children and collect fecal samples for polio tests could be retrained to look for cases of flu and pneumonia and possibly collect nasal swabs.

                            "They have vehicles and cellphones, so they're a valuable resource," he said. "It's a logical piggyback."

                            http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/12/in.../12assess.html
                            ...when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. - Sherlock Holmes

                            Comment


                            • #44
                              Human link to virus is studied

                              Human link to virus is studied

                              http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Story...&IssueID=28329

                              JAJI, Nigeria: Authorities in Nigeria are investigating whether a deadly bird flu strain discovered in this West African country last week has spread to humans after several people were reported ill, the health minister said yesterday.

                              Health officials are investigating "one or two cases of reported illnesses" among humans which could be due to bird flu, though none has been confirmed so far, Health Minister Eyitayo Lambo said.

                              Lambo said the investigation was being conducted in the northern state of Kaduna, where the H5N1 strain of the virus was reported for the first time in Africa last week, and the commercial capital, Lagos. He gave few details, but said he expected the probe to finish later yesterday with results released to the public today.

                              It is difficult for people to catch bird flu, and no human H5N1 cases have been recorded in Africa. But experts fear H5N1 could mutate into a strain that passes easily from human to human.
                              Authorities say at least 100,000 birds have died so far.

                              Yesterday, veterinary officials in Jaji destroyed chickens at farms suspected to have been infected with the fatal bird flu strain, slashing their necks, dumping them in pits and setting them ablaze.

                              Comment


                              • #45
                                People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria

                                People Falling Ill Near To Chickens With Bird Flu, Nigeria



                                This Article Also Appears In Infectious Diseases/Bacteria/Viruses

                                Main Category: Flu/Bird Flu/SARS News
                                Article Date: 11 Feb 2006 - 15:00pm (UK)

                                Two people have fallen ill with flu-like symptoms near the Sambawa Farms, Kaduna, where chickens are infected with the lethal H5N1 Bird Flu virus strain. Nigerian authorities say they are trying to establish whether these two people have been infected with the bird flu virus.

                                A few days bird flu infection among chickens was confirmed in northen Nigeria, in the state of Kaduna. A couple of days later it spilled into bordering states.

                                Information given out by Nigerian authorities as to exactly how many people may have bird flu like symptoms is patchy. Some say there are two people, while others say there are ?a few' suspected cases.

                                An rumour that a human case of bird flu was found in the south of Nigeria. There is no confirmation on whether this is true.

                                At the moment the procedure for confirming bird flu infection is as follows:

                                1. A sample is taken.
                                2. It is sent to a lab in Nigeria.
                                3. If it tests negative, that is the end of it.
                                4. It it tests positive, it is then sent abroad for confirmation.

                                Bird flu has made its way from Viet Nam, in south east Asia, across the world to Nigeria, in west Africa. Africa is a vast continent. If the virus spills over into Sub-Saharan Africa, one of the poorest regions in the world with a population of 600 million people, it will be extremely difficult to monitor. Local health experts say it would be virtually impossible to ask people in Sub Saharan Africa, many of whom are facing starvation, to surrender their chickens for culling.

                                People in Europe are concerned about the coming of Spring, when birds migrate from Africa to Europe (and parts of Asia).

                                Written by: Christian Nordqvist
                                Editor: Medical News Today

                                Comment

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