Canadian bird flu cases spreading
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-04-03 11:45

Bird flu is spreading quickly in British Columbia, and officials said on Friday they were studying an industry proposal that could lead to the slaughter of up 16 million birds to bring the situation under control.

Avian influenza has been diagnosed on 18 poultry farms in the Fraser Valley region east of Vancouver with up to 500,000 birds, but none of the strains identified so far were of a type known to cause serious illnesses in humans.

"It's spreading, and its spreading quickly," said Brian Evans, chief veterinarian with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

Officials have been trying to control the spread by eliminating flocks in the immediate area of Abbotsford, where the first case was discovered last month, but industry representatives want the "depopulation" extended to a much wider area.

"We have said to the industry that what they are proposing to us is an aggressive action," Evans told reporters in Abbotsford.

The industry proposal would include chickens, turkeys and other commercial poultry.

Federal Agriculture Minister Bob Speller, who toured the region on Friday, said he would decide on the industry's proposal once he had received a recommendation from his staff. Evans said a decision would be made "in days rather than weeks."

Officials said they believe the disease was spread between the farms by human activity rather than by ducks or other wild birds, which are believed to have been the source of infection at the first farm.

Evans said CFIA was concentrating on ensuring farmers use proper "bio-security measures" to limit the accidental spread of the disease by people or equipment.

Although the strain of the virus at the heart of the outbreak is not known to cause serious illness in humans, a health official said they want to eradicate it before it mutates into a more serious strain.

Two workers involved in eradicating infected birds have suffered mild illnesses doctors believe were contracted from the animals but have both since recovered.

British Columbia is not a significant source of poultry exports, but the outbreak has prompted the food inspection agency to ban the shipment of chickens out of the Fraser River region of southwestern British Columbia.

The flu strain found at the first farm was originally diagnosed as a low-pathogenic version of the virus, but officials later discovered it had mutated to a high-pathogenic version.

The pathogenicity is a measure of how the virus behaves in birds, agriculture officials stress.

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