EU may allow more flexibility in fight on bird flu
The Star, 23 Nov 2005

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union veterinary experts are likely to allow countries to tone down their efforts to minimize the risk of avian influenza ahead of Europe's next major influx of migratory birds, the Commission said on Tuesday. 

At present, EU governments may choose to order poultry to be kept indoors and must monitor high-risk areas where domestic and wild birds can congregate, such as ponds. 

They also have to monitor fly paths of migratory birds that could bring the disease into the 25-nation bloc from outside. These measures and recommendations are up for review on Dec. 1, and will be discussed by EU vets at a meeting on Wednesday. 

"There is clearly an appetite from some member states to scale down the measures," an official at the European Commission said. "But in the spring, there will be a new migratory influx and we need to be prepared ... and more vigilant again. 

The official said the existing safeguards introduced over the past two months would be extended beyond the start of December, but member states would be given scope to take a range of alternative steps if they wanted.  "The measures will be extended, and they relate to poultry indoors. But there is some flexibility that if you don't want to do that, you can take other measures," he told reporters during a meeting of EU agriculture ministers. 

Alternatives included allowing poultry to roam outside but feeding them indoors and not giving them access to water that could be contaminated by wild birds. It was not yet clear for how long the EU measures might be extended but any extension would have an expiry date attached to it, he said. 

EU governments might also be able to reduce their numbers of designated high-risk areas for bird flu, the official said. 

Bird flu is endemic in poultry in parts of Asia where it has killed at least 67 people. Migratory flocks have carried it into birds in Eastern Europe and Kuwait.