US Government Allows Americans To Eat Bird Flu-Infected Poultry

Fears Over Bird Flu Lead To International Bans On Poultry From Nebraska

So far Russia, Japan, the Philippines and Turkey have banned poultry originating in Nebraska. The ban is described as "short-term". A flock of turkeys from Nebraska tested positive to a mild strain of bird flu. Of course, if more flocks are found to be infected, the import ban will continue in those countries, and more countries are then likely to also ban the poultry.

From the IHT :

Deputy (Nebraska) state veterinarian Del Wilmot said Wednesday that the flock shows no sign of illness and was being prepared for slaughter and entry into the food supply.

...officials in the four countries are taking no chances. Wilmot said those countries have barred all poultry and related products, such as eggs, coming from Nebraska.

"This ban and other emergency measures were necessary to protect human health and the poultry industry in the Philippines," Arthur Yap, agriculture secretary for the Southeast Asian country, said in a news release issued Tuesday.

The Philippines is among three countries in Asia — the area with the greatest number human cases — to remain free of bird flu since 2003.

Karen Eggert, with the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, said the department has no qualms about sending the Seward County turkeys into the U.S. food supply.

To recap, Russia, Japan, the Philippines and Turkey have decided to ban Nebraskan poultry infected with a "mild" strain of bird flu.

But the American government doesn't believe bird flu can be caught from eating infected poultry meat or eggs and therefore has decided to allow infected poultry meat to enter the American food supply.

It's surprising the World Health Organisation has said nothing about this, so far.

American Pandemic Preparations Slow To A Crawl

News about the dangers of a bird flu pandemic in the human population of the United States has dropped out the news cycle in the past few months, so the vast majority of Americans, and their community, city and state leaders have lost interest in planning for such an eventuality :

Last November, Gartner Inc. analyst Ken McGee gave a presentation on the risk of an avian flu pandemic to an audience of IT professionals at a conference in Las Vegas. He concluded with this recommendation: Complete your pandemic planning by Q2 of 2007.

This year's second quarter ended on Saturday. But despite his admonition, McGee believes that few IT organizations are ready for a possible pandemic.

"Most clients would not be prepared if this descended upon the world tomorrow -- they just simply would not be ready," he said. "I think it's just part of the human condition: You don't put the stop sign up until after the traffic accident."

McGee is as concerned as ever about the threat of a pandemic, but he's worried that fears are waning in the U.S. And, he said, he's afraid "that people will learn the hard way that they cannot respond to a pandemic situation once it has been declared, because everyone will be trying to do that and nothing will get done."

The declining level of concern cited by McGee was backed up by poll results released Monday by Ipsos Public Affairs, a research organization that has offices in New York, Washington and other U.S. cities.

Ipsos conducted an online survey of 1,438 U.S. residents who are over the age of 18. When asked about the issue of avian flu in the U.S., 27% of the respondents said they were "concerned" -- down from 35% in a similar survey last year. Forty-one percent said they were "not concerned," compared with 31% a year ago.

The Ipsos poll received almost no news coverage, according to a Google News search. Indeed, one of the poll questions asked, "How much have you read, heard or seen about bird flu?" In 2006, 74% of the people who were surveyed answered "a lot/some." This year, the percentage of respondents who chose that answer fell to 56%.

Scott McPherson, CIO of the Florida House of Representatives and head of the Florida CIO Pandemic Preparedness Committee, tracks news about the avian flu on a daily basis. He can quickly cite the most recent mortality rates or list recent incidents, such as the death of five swans and a goose in Germany due to the H5N1 bird-flu virus. McPherson said he's mystified by the lack of attention that the threat is getting in the U.S.

He contrasted that with the level of interest that the avian flu gets in countries such as Indonesia. "If you live in Jakarta, this is all you think about it," McPherson said. "If you live in the United States, all you think about is Paris Hilton. What the heck has happened to us?"

US Cuts More Than $600 Million From Vaccine Research, Pandemic Preparedness Funding

Does the US government now view the possibility of a bird flu pandemic as less of a threat than it did back in 2005, or are they cutting funding to what were once deemed "essential" pandemic related funding programs because the Iraq War is soaking up increasingly rare government dollars right across the board?

Jay From ThreatsWatch writes :

....in the latest Defense spending bill, a mere $13.2 million to address avian flu research and monitoring was provided. But the bill was passed without $650 million in pandemic preparedness spending that had been included in an earlier version of the bill. The earlier bill was vetoed by President Bush because it set a timetable for starting a US withdrawal from Iraq.

The exclusion of the pandemic money doesn’t mean Congress won’t appropriate anything for that purpose this year, but it does suggest that a considerable delay is likely, said Richard Hamburg, government relations director for Trust for America’s Health, a public health advocacy group based in Washington, DC.

“This is going to delay completion of the initial commitment by the president to supply at least $7.1 billion in funding,” he said, referring to Bush’s request for pandemic preparedness funds in November 2005. “And we’re certainly concerned about the fate of those dollars and whether they’ll go into another vehicle.”

The deleted $650 million included $625 million for vaccines, antivirals, other medical supplies, and diagnostic and surveillance tools, according to a text of the earlier bill that was vetoed (HR 1591). The sum also included $25 million to compensate individuals for any injuries caused by H5N1 influenza vaccines.

The World Health Organisation repeatedly issues media releases saying the world must not lose focus on pandemic prevention and preparedness as human victims of the H5N1 virus lessen (on last year's figures), but the United States government appears to be taking an approach that says, "We won't pour tons of money into funding vaccine research, but we will tell you about lots of ways you can prepare your business, home and community to cope with a pandemic outbreak."

The actual value of creating a vaccine for a mutated virus strain that has yet to show itself completely has always been debatable, but the WHO will no doubt be troubled by the US government appearing to take its foot off the accelerator in preparing the country for the expected pandemic.

It will probably provide little comfort to Americans to know that President Bush can now seize control of the National Guard in the event of a pandemic, and can bypass FEMA to allow the White House and the Pentagon to control how the government as a whole will deal with a storm of contingencies and problems resulting from a pandemic that are all but impossible to comprehend, let alone act on in a clear and decisive way.

As with the people of New Orleans during the Hurricane Katrina disaster, Americans will probably have to get used to the idea that should a massive and extremely deadly H5N1 pandemic break out amongst the human population, they will be pretty much on their own.

No doubt this is why so many of the state-level seminars and meetings being held across the United States today, encourage local governments and councils to prepare their communities and emergency responses independent of the government's still vague plans.

When your local mayor tells you to put aside a few boxes of canned and dried food and a few dozen litres of water, it won't hurt to follow the mayor's advice. Just in case.

United States : Pandemic Impact On Local Schools Examined

Lots Of Questions, But Few Answers

A local meeting of school officials, community leaders and parents in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, aimed to examine the local impact of US government guidelines that schools will have to be closed down for eight to twelve weeks during outbreaks of pandemic bird flu.

Actually sitting down and discussing the effects of school closures on students, parents and the local communities throws a harsh and disturbing light on just how improbable such plans to stem the spread of pandemic bird flu actually are.

The US government, and state governments, may demand school closures, but actually doing will create a vast array of logistical problems, severe economic impacts and even the breakdown of local communities.

Finding and reading local newspaper reports, like the one excerpted below, reveal just how devastating the impact of a bird flu pandemic in the United States, and around the world, will actually turn out to be, and that's outside the huge death tolls and the large percentage of the population expected to fall seriously ill.

The plans to cope with pandemic bird flu are being examined on local levels now, but such meetings reveal just how completely unprepared communities are, and will probably remain for the next few years at least.

From AL.com :

Closing schools has been determined to be one of the best defenses to slow the spread of a flu outbreak, but the implications of long-term school closings are staggering. A flu outbreak of huge proportions would force school doors shut for weeks, if not months.

School administrators, health officials, law enforcement officers and business executives gathered recently to discuss how to handle closing schools for such an extended time. They also received a lesson on the realities of a flu pandemic.

One scenario being discussed is a widespread outbreak that comes in three waves, each lasting eight weeks. That's more than half a year.

"The cycle we depend on to work would be completely disrupted," said Andy Rucks, an associate professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham's School of Public Health.

Rucks, who works with the South Central Public Health Partnership, led the tabletop exercise on school closings as a way to counter pandemic influenza. He and others are conducting similar exercises across the state.

"It could disrupt the school-year cycle permanently, so much that we will have to rethink how graduation or education will continue to work," Rucks said.

With kindergarten through 12th grades closed indefinitely, the balance of the community work force and life would come unhinged. Schools, after all, provide a form of day care for working parents.

From there the effects would spiral. Without a full work force, the local economy would be disrupted.

The federal government has urged everyone from individuals to businesses to establish detailed pandemic flu preparedness plans.

The Alabama Department of Education began working with the state Department of Public Health in February 2006 to create awareness about bird flu and start drafting a plan, should the illness become a reality here.

Closing schools for occurrences such as inclement weather is significantly different from closing them in the case of a pandemic. Once the weather event is over, schools typically reopen. But with widespread illness possibly affecting teachers, students and bus drivers, the impact would go beyond a few days.

The questions ran the gamut:

_How would students still receive an education during that time?

_Would teachers and staff be paid?

_How would students who receive free or reduced lunch be fed?

_Would latchkey children become the overwhelming norm? Or would parents have to take off work to stay at home with their child?

Answers, however, were limited.

Insights Into How American Towns And Cities Fought The 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic

The New York Times story we linked to in our last post, about the US government's new categorisation system for flu pandemics, also contains some fascinating insights into how the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic was fought in towns and cities across the United States.

The Centre For Disease Control and the University of Michigan's medical school conducted a study into how 44 American cities coped with the Spanish Flu outbreaks. Newspaper clippings form the era, and hospital records, were examined, to find out why some American cities were devastated by the outbreaks, and others managed to control them.

From the New York Times :

While a few tiny towns escaped the epidemic entirely by cutting off all contact with outside, most cities took less drastic measures.

These included isolating the sick and quarantining homes and rooming houses, closing schools, churches, bars and other gathering places, canceling parades, ball games, theaters and other public events, staggering factory hours, barring door-to-door sales, discouraging the use of public transport and encouraging the use of face masks.

The most effective measure seemed to be moving early and quickly.

For example, said Dr. Howard Markel, a medical historian and one of the study’s leaders, Philadelphia, the worst-hit city, had nearly three times as many sick and dead per capita as St. Louis, which had was hit weeks later by the virus moving inland from the Eastern Seaboard and had time to react as soon as flu cases rose above averages.

“No matter how you set up the model,” Dr. Markel said, “the cities that acted earlier and with more layered protective measures fared better.”

US FACES MASSIVE SHORTAGE OF LIFE-SAVING VENTILATORS IN PANDEMIC OUTBREAK

From the New York Times :

"Right now, there are 105,000 ventilators, and even during a regular flu season, about 100,000 are in use. In a worst-case human pandemic, according to the national preparedness plan issued by President Bush in November, the country would need as many as 742,500.

"To some experts, the ventilator shortage (a machine to pump oxygen into the lungs) is the most glaring example of the country's lack of readiness for a pandemic.

"'This is a life-or-death issue, and it reflects everything else that's wrong about our pandemic planning,' said Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University. 'The government puts out a 400-page plan, but we don't have any ventilators and there isn't much chance we're going to get them.'

"Families are going to be told, 'We have to take your loved one off the ventilator even though, if we could keep him on it for a week, he might be fine....How do you think that's going to go over? It's going to be a nightmare.'"

KILLER INFLUENZA VACCINE BREAKTHROUGH : HUMAN COLD VIRUS MAY HOLD KEY

Researchers in the US have genetically engineered a human cold virus in their search for a vaccine to avian influenza, and they are claiming it is one hundred percent effective in mice and chickens.

So your chickens and mice will survive, even if you don't.

"While production of a conventional flu vaccine requires months of work and large numbers of fertilized chicken eggs, the researchers reported Thursday that they prepared their vaccine in only 36 days, growing it in a laboratory dish.

"The ability to produce a new vaccine so quickly could give public health officials a powerful new tool to combat the H5N1 bird flu virus if it should mutate and begin infecting humans widely.

"The team is working with the Food and Drug Administration to begin human tests of the vaccine, said Dr. Andrea Gambotto of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, who led the team. He said those trials could begin within weeks."

US CITIES AND TOWNS TOLD NOT TO EXPECT FED GOV TO HELP DURING PANDEMIC FLU OUTBREAK

"Any community that fails to prepare - with the expectation that the federal government can or will offer a lifeline - will be tragically wrong," said Alex Azar, deputy secretary for the Department of Health and Human Services, at a meeting of American mayors last week on the threat of an influenza pandemic sweeping across the United States.

Azar said mayors should be prepping for a worst-case scenario, with the 1918 avian influenza outbreak that killed beyond 60 million people worldwide being the worst case.

Using the 1918 outbreak as a model would mean an estimated 30% of the population falling ill, 15% of all Americans needing significant medical attention, with 2% of all Americans dying from pandemic influenza.

Or roughly 6 to 7 million Americans.

Full article here.

THE GLOBAL BIRD FLU PANDEMIC AS A FOREST FIRE ANALOGY

US and Asian medical experts hooked up for a teleconference last week to discuss world preparedness. The US pushed their point that preparing locally will prove useless should the rest of the world not be as prepared. They intend to make sure every human and animal outbreak of avian influenza is reported, though there were few clear directives as to how a global watch on outbreaks would be put into practice.

The U.S. assistant secretary for health, Dr. John Agwunobi, tried to explain his government's "flexible response" to the pandemic with the Forest Fire Analogy.

"....the world is a large forest and a small spark occurs in a particular part of this forest.

"If we have an opportunity to aggressively throw all our resources at that spark and put out that fire, we will do so. However, if we sense that the spark has gone beyond its initial circle and is now spreading rapidly around the planet our strategy might have to change."

'Standard' Flu Virus Spreads Rapidly Through US

6.8% OF ALL US DEATHS DUE TO INFLUENZA VIRUS

ABC America sources the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for a report on how the annual US flu season is picking up dramatic speed, with "widespread" flu activity reported in California, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Wyoming and Texas.

"According to the CDC, the flu is a contagious respiratory illness caused by many different influenza viruses," reported ABC America.

Fox News has a report giving a few details about the dismal state of emergency wards in hospitals in some of the US's biggest cities.

Emergency department facilities have declined by 14% through the past twelve years, leaving the US vulnerable to the aftermath of major terrorist attacks further weather events like Hurricane Katrin, or, perhaps worst of all, the full blown outbreak of the bird flu virus.

Few virologists doubt a massive flu pandemic is coming, its .a matter of not if, but when, as so many World Health Organisation officials keep reminding us.

Today, emergency departments in at least six major US cities are quickly being filled with flu-sick people. Some have already been forced to close their doors to new patients, unable to cope with those already inside the facilities.

PRESIDENT BUSH PREPARES U.S. FOR MILITARY RULE IF INFLUENZA PANDEMIC BECOMES REALITY

By Darryl Mason

Last week as President Bush toured hurricane disaster zones in Texas and Louisiana, he spoke of the need for the US military to “take control” in the event of another national disaster, which would include a bird flu pandemic.

Bush visited Northern Command, the military bunker where the movement of more than half a million active and National Guard soldiers can be controlled and coordinated in the event of a massive national disaster.

Bush also visited the Randolph Air Force Base where, in a pre-arranged discussion before the US media, a Major General John White talked up the idea of creating a national response plan for mass disaster, with the military in key roles.

Bush said he liked the idea, and cited the disorganisation that followed in the wake of Hurricane Katrina as a reason why such a plan may have great value.

Although Bush said it would be up to Congress to consider the circumstances where Northern Command and the Department of Defence would become the lead agencies for disaster response, it was clear he had already decided the military would be deployed should another massive hurricane threaten the country.

“...is there a natural disaster of a certain size that would then enable the Defence Department to become the lead agency in coordinating and leading the response effort?” Bush asked, rhetorically.

Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said the president intended to establish “a very clear line of authority” should the US be hit with another major catastrophe.

McClellan cited “an outbreak” of bird flu as being one kind of catastrophe that should see a military response and co-ordination role.

"You need to mobilise assets and resources and logistics and communications very quickly to help stabilise or contain the situation," McClellan said. "The organisation, in the president's mind, that has the capability to do that is the Department of Defence."

McClellan was clear in citing “an epidemic” of bird flu being the kind of situation that Bush would see as being worthy of a military response, which would essentially place the Pentagon in control of the entire country, via Northern Command.

Last week, Indonesian authorities called the spread of bird flu and the deaths of at least five people “an epidemic”.

At least three stops on the Bush disaster zone tour were to purposely place the president in the locations where he would be seen should a massive catastrophe strike the US again and the military was needed.

One specific location was the Northern Command bunker, strengthened to withstand a direct nuclear strike, earthquakes and hurricanes. There are at least 60 such bunkers scattered across the US, inside mountains, under airports, and both below and close to the White House.

Bush spent his vacation reading a book about the flu pandemic of 1918 that saw upwards of 50 million people dying around the world, or 20% of the world’s population.

Within days of returning from his vacation Bush was talking about the global threat of bird flu and how the US needed to take the lead in both fighting and controlling a deadly pandemic.

Bush remained fixated on the threat of bird flu through his six stop tour of hurricane ravaged states and discussed pandemic scenarios with Northern Command staff during hurricane rescue and recovery briefings.

If Congress does not object to Bush’s plan to invoke military rule of the US during a national disaster, then the president would be free to take command of all states and counties, bypassing local officials, following the first human bird flu deaths in North America.


AUSTRALIANS RUSH PHARMACIES IN SEARCH OF ANTI-VIRALS

DRUGS ALREADY IN SHORT SUPPLY UNLESS YOU’RE A GOVERNMENT MINISTER

Chemists across Australia are running out of anti-virals stocks and hundreds of customers are now on months long waiting lists.

The much publicised anti-viral Tamiflu has proven to be most popular, despite courses of the drug costing up to $50 each.

The federal government has spent more than $100 million of taxpayers money stockpiling some 4 million courses of anti-virals, and have compiled a priority list in the event of an outbreak.

Naturally, senior government ministers are at the top of the list, though no minister has confirmed whether family members will also be given anti-virals. Emergency health workers will be dosed up, as will funeral industry workers and select members of the Armed Forces.

Health Minister Tony Abbott said the government stockpile would protect a million workers in “essential services” for six or so weeks.

The UK government has a priority list that includes senior government ministers and a curious assortment of corporate heads and chief executives, along with a selection of media personalities who will be expected to help contain the panic if a pandemic breaks out.

Tamiflu is made by Roche, they have now doubled production of the anti-viral in Australia but warned recently it could take up to a year to make the drugs.

Roche is now the target of growing campaign aimed at forcing the corporation to give up its patent on Tamiflu so a generic version can be mass produced all over the world.

But some virologists have warned that as a human-to-human strain of bird flu has not yet shown itself there was no guarantee the anti-virals would work on everybody who took them. There was also the possibility of the virus mutating further once it was active in humans and growing beyond the control of anti-virals like Tamiflu.

In the end the Australian government may have spent $100 million amassing the world’s largest stockpile of a drug that doesn’t work.

The problem is, virologists have claimed, we won’t know whether the anti-virals will work for most people until it is too late, until that is when a bird flu pandemic has begun.


INDONESIA HOLDS FIRST MASS CULL OF BIRD FLU INFECTED PIGS

AGRICULTURE MINISTER CLAIMED IN JULY BIRD FLU WAS AIRBORNE

The Sydney Morning Herald reported yesterday that hundreds of people gathered to watch the mass slaughter and burning of dozens of pigs in a Javanese village in July this year.

The Indonesian Agriculture Minister, Anton Apriantono, warned reporters that they should be wearing masks to protect themselves as they witnessed the pig cull.

“This is very dangerous,” the minister announced, “...the virus can be transmitted through the air.”

“Don’t blame me if you get bird flu because you don’t have a mask,” he said.

The slaughter of pigs and ducks in the Tangerang region, close to Jakarta, took place after Ivan Rapei and his two young daughters died with symptoms of heavy pneumonia. Mr Rapei was confirmed to have been infected with the bird flu virus.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported tests completed in April showed pig farms with infected with bird flu, but that no official culls were ordered.

17 of the 22 Indonesians quarantined over the weekend lived in Tangerang or in areas near Jakarta.

The World Health Organisation now claims that Indonesia’s refusals to conduct mass culls in bird flu infected areas made the country the bird flu “hot spot” in a global campaign to avert a pandemic.

WHO officials claimed Indonesia has known for months that the virus was “entrenched” in the poultry populations.”

WHO claims the start of a pandemic could begin when a person has both a normal flu virus and the avian influenza strain at the same time and a genetic exchange occurs between the two viruses.

The Sydney Morning Herald claimed that the Ragunan Zoo in Jakarta was kept open for at least two days after half of the exotic bird collected showed positive test results for bird flu. Hundreds of expatriates visited the zoo unaware of the bird flu outbreak, taking part in a charity fun run.

More than a hundred zoo visitors were refused treatment for flu-like symptoms at Jakarta’s main infectious disease hospital last week. They were told to come back if the symptoms grew “more serious”.

Health minister Siti Fadilah Supari now says the possibility of human transmission of bird flu was inevitable, after earlier denying such infections were possible.

Criteria for a mass cull, where compensation from the Indonesian government would be due, has been set at an infection rate of 20% for all poultry in one farm. No mass culls have taken place, claims Indonesia, because no farms have shown such a rate of infection.

Arguments now rage in the Indonesian government on whether the country is suffering through an epidemic of bird flu. Many government ministers fear public announcements of an increased threat from bird flu would reduce tourist numbers and impact negatively on the economy.


AUSTRALIA PANICS OVER INDONESIAN RESPONSE TO BIRD FLU EPIDEMIC

CHANGES ANTI-VIRAL DONATION FROM 10,000 DOSES TO 50,000 DOSES OVER WEEKEND

The Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has expressed his alarm at Indonesia’s slow response in dealing with a human outbreak of the bird flu virus and has upped the donation of anti-virals to some 50,000 doses after originally scheduling only 10,0000 doses last Friday.

Only days after the World Health Organisation said there remained only a short time before a human pandemic of bird flu virus began, Downer appeared disturbed on Australian television news this evening as he said Indonesia was find the outbreak “difficult to handle”.

"I think they have been caught a bit short, to tell you the truth,” he said.

Downer claimed Indonesia was getting better organised, through the support of the WHO, but Indonesian officials are still refusing the basic WHO guidelines that call for mass bird culls in areas where deaths from the bird flu virus has occurred.

The outbreak of bird flu is expected to head agendas at the November Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting, and the December East Asia Summit.


RICH NATIONS WON’T PAY FOR BIRD FLU RESEARCH AND CONTAINMENT

The AP news service reports tonight that only $20 million out of a proposed $100 million UN fund to fight the spread of bird flu has been pledged by the world’s richest countries.

The $100 million is being sought for the vaccination of poultry and to fund international analysis of bird flu virus samples from countries already infected, including Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam.

Vietnam has seen the highest death toll in humans with 40 succumbing to the virus since human infections began in early 2003.

The Indonesian outbreak, labelled an epidemic last week, is the focus of the world fight against bird flu but officials are resisting international calls to spend the tens of millions of dollars needed for mass culls of poultry and the quarantining of bird flu infected villages.

Indonesian government officials have repeatedly stated the threat of bird flu is a problem for the whole world, not just Indonesia.


IRAN FEARS INFECTIONS FROM MIGRATING WILD BIRDS

Reuters news service reported today that Iran is gearing up for an outbreak of bird flu, although the government has claimed it has not found any infected poultry.

"We will most probably get the bird flu carried by the millions of wild birds that are on their way to Iran," said Behrouz Yasemi, spokesman for Iran's veterinary authority.

During the winter, millions of ducks, waterfowl and wild geese migrate into northern Iran’s lakes and wetlands.

So far the Iranian government has warned poultry farmers to keep their stock isolated from wild birds and has collected and tested 1700 samples. Behrouz Yasemi told Rueters they are yet to find a single infection.

"We have not got it yet, but we plan to be prepared for it when it arrives in our northern provinces," he added.

Iran successfully dealt with a previous bird flu outbreak in poultry during 2003 by placing a ban on all bird products imported from East Asia.

Stopping wild migrating birds from mixing with poultry will prove much more difficult.

The Iranian government has formed a bird flu committee bringing together veterinary experts and members of the ministries of health, agriculture and the environment.

The committee recently announced a nationwide ban on hunting wild birds and banned the importation of bird products from both Kazakhstan and Russia, where outbreaks of bird flu has already killed millions of wild birds and poultry.

The governments of Russia and Kazakhstan have, in reply, banned all bird products imported from Iran.


INDONESIA REFUSES MASS POULTRY CULLS DESPITE SPREAD OF BIRD FLU

The Jakarta Post said today few new measures have been taken to contain the spread of bird flu almost a week after government officials called the outbreak “an epidemic”.

Even in areas where the virus has killed humans no mass culls have begun, despite international calls and growing pressure from the World Health Organisation.

Poultry farmers are reluctant to do their own culls without compensation from the government and are complaining about a shortage of vaccine for poultry.

The bird flu virus is believed to have infected two thirds of country’s provinces, with high concentrations of poultry massed in towns through the provinces of Java and West Sulawesi.

Two weeks ago more than 1500 egg-laying pullets died in a matter of days in the town of Tulungagung, but no new supplies of vaccine have arrived for the surviving poultry population of two million.

Farmers are demanding free vaccine for their birds after a lack of compensation following mass poultry culls in the district during last year’s outbreak.

In Southeast Sulawesi more than eight million farm birds need to be vaccinated, but only 200,000 doses of vaccine have been distributed so far.

Indonesia has more than one billion poultry across its 33 provinces, and some 300 million free-range chickens. 60 percent of Indonesia’s entire poultry is concentrated in Java, the most densely populated area outside of Jakarta.

WHO guidelines demand a mass cull of all birds in a three kilometre radius of any bird flu infection in poultry.

Indonesia refuses to initiate the mass culls, claiming there is a lack of funds to compensate the farmers.


INDONESIA RAMPS UP HUMAN QUARANTINE MEASURES

The Jakarta Post reported tonight that five of 21 one people quarantined over the weekend at the Sulianti Saroso Infectious Disease Hospital in Jakarta have been released following negative tests for bird flu infection.

Sixteen patients remain in the hospital suffering bird-flu like symptoms.

Basic tests from a five year old girl who died last week proved negative for bird flu, but a final confirmation wont be given until full results are confirmed by a laboratory in Hong Kong on Thursday.

Two weeks ago there were only four hospitals assigned to treat bird flu victims in Indonesia. This has now been dramatically ramped up to more than 40 hospitals, although there remains a lack of essential equipment such as respirators.

Indonesia is now waiting on a promised delivery of 10,000 doses of Tamiflu from the Australian stockpile of 3-4 million, the largest per capita in the world.



AUSTRALIAN SEIZES POULTRY IMPORTS IN FEAR OF BIRD FLU INFECTION

ANOTHER BIRD FLU DEATH IN INDONESIA

AUSTRALIA DONATES 50,000 DOSES OF ANTI-VIRALS TO HELP CONTAIN OUTBREAK

The death today of a 27 year old woman from bird flu has raised the Indonesian toll to a suspected six victims.

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer told reporters that the 50,000 doses of anti-virals that Australia was ‘buying’ for Indonesia would “give the Indonesians the capacity to deal with the problem, at least in the short-term."

"I think they've been caught a bit short, to tell you the truth, and they're
finding it difficult to handle," he said.

The Australian www.news.com.au site reported today that anti-viral medications were being distributed through Indonesia’s population, but supplies were greatly limited and the distribution was at a crawl.

Downer criticised Indonesia for its slow reaction to the bird flu outbreak and said he hoped the involvement of the WHO would speed up the distribution of anti-virals.

It has been announced that Australian Quarantine officers have seized more than five tonnes of poultry and bird products at Australian airports alone in the past twelve months.

Screenings of flights entering Australia from bird flu infected countries have turned up thousands of eggs, thousands of moon cakes, hundreds of kilos of egg noodles and more than 60 tonnes of feathers.

Despite such protective measures, there is nothing that can be done to stop migrating birds infected with bird flu entering the country.

"No country either can, or for that matter should, try to stop birds migrating,” said Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, “...birds do move between Australia and other parts of the world....as the seasons change."



BALI FEARS FALL IN TOURISTS IF BIRD FLU HITS ISLAND

According to the Jakarta Post, Indonesian Hotel and Restaurants Association (PHRI) chairwoman Yanti Sukamdani Hardjoparkoso has raised the alarm about the potential impact of the bird flu outbreak on tourism, and in particular a feared downturn in visitors to Bali.

She cited the Ragunan Zoo, where at least a hundred people, including a school group of thirty children, are believed to have been exposed to virus infected birds, as an example of how poorly the Indonesian government has handled the outbreak thus far.

"People may never want to visit the zoo again after the government was so wishy-washy about whether the place was safe from bird flu or not," Yanti told the Jakarta Post.

Ragunan Zoo was closed on September 19 after twenty out of some thirty birds tested were found to be positive for the virus.

Yanti said it would only take one tourist to fall ill for the bad news to spread and begin to affect the vital tourist industry.

She said tourists were more afraid of an outbreak of disease than they were of a terrorist attack. Yanti called for measures to be taken now to halt the spread of bird flu, rather than trying to repair the damage once it was done.

Indonesia’s lacklustre response to the bird flu outbreak is now raising fears that the infections might be more widespread than they have so far announced. Indonesian government officials are refusing to initiate mass bird culls across the two thirds of the provinces already infected.




AUSTRALIA ANNOUNCES FAR NORTH PATROLS TO FIGHT BIRD FLU

MIGRATING BIRDS AND AIRLINE PASSENGERS TO BE TARGETED

Rueters news service reported on the weekend that the Australian government is stepping up measures to prevent an outbreak of bird flu by targeting migrating birds from Asia now arriving in the far north of Queensland.

"Certainly they are a potential risk," Carson Creagh, spokesman for the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service, told Reuters.

But while many birds from Indonesia land in areas like the north western town of Broome, in the Northern Territory, some birds fly straight down to the eastern coastline.

Blood samples are now being taken from migrating birds in the far north Cape York region of Queensland, but tests have not yet turned up positive for bird flu.

While migrating birds could bring bird flu to Australia, United Nations research has shown the greatest threat comes from visitors carrying poultry or bird products, all of which are banned by Australia's strict quarantine laws.

Regardless, Australia reported more than five tonnes of poultry and bird products were seized from visitors arriving at international airports during the past twelve months.

There was also a threat from unusual medicinal practises using bird products, such as drinking the blood of an infected bird or “sucking the mucus out of the nostrils of fighting cocks”, according to Rueters.

Flights into Australia from 11 countries are now being screened in order to stop passengers from bringing poultry and bird products into the country.

Barbecued chickens, duck meat, chicken feet and duck tongues have been found in passengers luggage, despite numerous warnings during flights into Australia, and a string of warning signs and dumping stations leading up to customs desks.

X-ray machines, detector dogs and bag inspections are used to screen luggage and bags.

Hundreds of millions of dollars will now be spent overhauling the security of Australia’s airports.