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900,000 Thais to help fight bird flu
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BANGKOK: Thailand has assigned 900,000 volunteers to perform house-to-house checks for signs of the deadly bird flu virus, Health Minister Suchai Charoenrata-nakul said yesterday. The initiative, to be coordinated by 9,700 local health offices, comes as Thailand tries to combat bird flu following the country's 13th death from the virus. The programme, which also involves bringing possibly infected subjects to hospitals, is similar to a campaign launched last year. About 957 hospitals across the country have been ordered to ask possibly infected patients whether they lived in affected areas or had any contact with sick or dead chickens before they fell ill, Suchai said in a statement. "With all these measures, we are confident we can prevent the disease becoming widespread." |
In Taiwan, a top health official called UK veterinary experts irresponsible for saying a South American parrot infected with the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu picked up the virus from Taiwanese birds in British quarantine. "The British authorities do not have solid evidence while making a statement implicating the possible source of a bird flu virus in another country," Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine deputy director Yeh Ying said. In Britain, chief veterinary officer Debby Reynolds said tests are still underway on the birds imported from Taiwan. She told BBC that the birds from Taiwan had died, with the exact cause yet to be determined. The European Commission will propose a temporary ban on imports of live captive and pet birds to prevent the spread of bird flu within the European Union, an EU official said yesterday. |
The executive Commission would present its proposals to veterinary experts from the EU's 25 member states today, he said. Meanwhile, another region in Russia confirmed an outbreak of H5N1 and Croatia said it would cull more poultry after finding two dead wild swans suspected of having an avian flu strain. The outbreak in Tambov, 400km southeast of Moscow, lead authorities to cull 53 ducks and hens and impose a quarantine. A weekend report that China would close its borders if it detected human-to-human transmission of bird flu unsettled the Hongkong stock market with shares in hotels, retailers and airlines sliding yesterday. Agencies
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