Bird Flu Confirmed in Wild Swans Across Europe

BRUSSELS, Belgium, February 13, 2006 (ENS) - Bird flu of the deadly H5N1 strain has been confirmed in wild swans in Italy, in Greece, and in Bulgaria, the reference laboratory that tested samples from those countries told the European Commission today.

In Slovenia, a wild swan tested positive for the disease at the Slovenian Laboratory for Avian influenza, and samples have been sent to the EU Reference Laboratory for Avian Influenza in Weybridge, UK for further tests.

The Slovenian authorities have given a commitment to the European Commission to apply immediately the same precautionary measures as those set out in the Commission Decision adopted for Greece on Friday, and applied in Italy during the weekend.

Precautionary measures involve establishing a three kilometer (two mile) high risk area around each of the outbreaks and a surrounding surveillance zone of 10 kilometers.

In the protection zone, poultry must be kept indoors and movement of poultry is banned except directly to the slaughterhouse. No meat may be sent outside the zone unless the meat is sourced from healthy animals in registered farms, and is subject to checks by slaughterhouse veterinarians both before and after slaughter.

In both the protection and the surveillance zones, on-farm biosecurity measures must be strengthened, hunting of wild birds is banned, and disease awareness education of poultry owners and their families must be carried out.

The Slovenian authorities are in close contact with their Austrian counterparts, since the 10 kilometers surveillance area crosses the Slovenian-Austrian border.

Wild swans on England's River Avon in a designated Environmentally Sensitive Area (Photo courtesy Defra)

The bird conservation organization BirdLife International says if wild birds have any role, it is minor compared to other mechanisms such as movements of untreated poultry and poultry products, and the global trade in poultry. Another suspected mechanism is the use of infected poultry manure as fertilizer in agriculture and aquaculture, and as feed in fish-farms and pig farms, BirdLife says.

While a few outbreaks are consistent with the direction and timing of wild bird migration, most are not, BirdLife says, pointing out that the 2005 autumn migration came and went without migrating waterbirds spreading H5N1. The virus has not so far been reported from the birds' wintering areas in India, the Philippines, the Pacific and Africa.

The evidence suggests that H5N1 is highly lethal to migratory wild bird species, and kills them quickly; that infected migrants cannot move long distances; and that the virus is most likely to be contracted locally, close to the site of deaths, BirdLife maintains.

So, BirdLife concludes that "wild birds could possibly have been involved in some H5N1 outbreaks (more likely in none) but other factors appear to be much more important – and should be the first focus of control efforts."

In Italy, the five infected wild swans were detected on the eastern coast of Sicily, in Taranto and in Calabria. The confirmatory tests were carried out by the Italian national laboratory for avian influenza in Padua, an accredited EU laboratory and also the reference laboratory of the Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Animal Health Organization, following preliminary positive tests undertaken by laboratories in Palermo, Portici and Foggia.

In Greece, the infected birds tested were three dead wild swans found in the prefectures of Thessaloniki and Pieria last week.

The avian influenza situation in these affected countries will be reviewed by the Standing Committee on the Food and Chain and Animal Health which meets on February 16 and 17.

The disease was detected last week in wild swans in the Bulgarian wetland region of Vidin, close to the Romanian border. The Bulgarian authorities have also informed the Commission of other suspected cases in wetlands close to the Black Sea.

Wild swans have been found infected with bird flu in an increasing number of European countries. (Photo courtesy FreeFoto)

Currently, no Bulgarian poultry or poultry products can be imported into the EU, as restrictive measures are already in place due to recent Newcastle disease outbreaks in Bulgaria. But as the Newcastle Disease restrictions are expected to be reviewed and possibly eased in the near future, the Commission says it is necessary to also adopt this regionalized import ban for the areas affected with avian influenza.

Romania said on Saturday that it has discovered new cases of suspected bird flu in waterfowl in the Danube delta, where the disease was first found last October. The delta is Europe's largest wetland and lies on an important migratory route for wild birds.

Elsewhere across Europe, France extended its poultry confinement measures in January from 26 to 58 departments of the 96 in mainland France.

Earlier this month, Germany ordered poultry to be kept indoors for at least two months after March 1 to safeguard German flocks. Authorities in the Netherlands said they will follow suit.

Officials in Ukraine's Crimea peninsula in January detected new cases of bird flu among wild birds in the port of Sevastopol. More than 200,000 birds have been destroyed in Ukraine since the H5N1 virus was discovered in a dozen villages in northeastern Crimea last year.

In the UK, the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said today that even taking account of the latest incidents in Eastern Europe, its current risk assessment "is increased but still low."

But there is "a high risk of further global dispersal, and future events may lead us to change our risk assessment," Defra said.

Chief Veterinary Officer Debby Reynolds said last week, “Defra is working in close partnership with the UK poultry industry, independent experts and others to ensure that the UK is thoroughly prepared to prevent an outbreak of avian flu and has robust plans in place to contain and eradicate it if it does occur.

“In December we launched the Poultry Register," Reynolds said. "Its purpose is to provide a central database of information on poultry premises. This information will only be used for preventing and controlling avian flu, more specifically: to improve our risk assessment and contingency planning; and to enable effective up to date communication with poultry keepers."

UK poultry keepers with 50 or more birds have a legal obligation to register. "Priority has been given to these flocks because, if infected, they could act as significant sources of disease spread as they are large enough for virus to circulate and multiply sufficiently to spread infection through movement to or other contacts with another premises," said Reynolds.

In Azerbaijan, a country between Asia and Europe, the first outbreak of the H5N1 strain of bird flu was discovered on Friday. Azerbaijan animal health authorities said the virus was found in wild birds in the Caspian Sea near the Absheron peninsula and off the southern Massaly region, near the border with Iran.