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China going all out to halt bird
flu
By Antoaneta Bezlova
BEIJING - Rushing to prevent a repetition of the
public panic over the severe acute respiratory syndrome
(SARS) outbreak last year, China is pulling out all
stops to arrest the spread of deadly avian virus
discovered in southern part of the country.
The
mass culling of poultry in three provinces was reported
by the state-run media, and top health experts went on
state television and radio to give advice on public
hygiene and assuage public jitters.
"Prevention
work against bird flu dates back over 100 years and many
nations have accumulated valuable experience, which
proves the feasibility of preventing a serious
outbreak," said Jia Youling, chief expert on farming
with the Ministry of Agriculture.
The
bird-influenza crisis, which has now spread over 10
Asian countries, not only may affect the Chinese economy
but may cause a revolution in the eating habits of
millions in the world's most populous country.
The growing affluence of the population has seen
meat consumption jump fivefold in the past 20 years.
Meanwhile, the introduction of US-style battery chicken
farming in China has helped make chicken so cheap that
it now rivals pork in popularity.
Thousands of
KFC branches opened up in the country to cater to a diet
that, given the current pace of growth, would turn China
into a massive food importer within another decade.
Providing animal feed has already turned groups
such as the once-penniless Liu brothers, who own the New
Hope Group, into some of the richest people in China,
and indeed in Asia. China's growing appetite for meat is
also raising hopes among US farmers that China can
become a gold mine if its agricultural imports keep
growing.
Already, China has become one of the
prime investment destinations for the Thai-based Charoen
Pokphand Group, the world's largest chicken producer and
animal-feed miller.
After the success of
Thailand's agribusiness, other countries including
India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Cambodia,
Vietnam, South Korea, Myanmar have tried to follow suit
and introduce intensive bird-rearing techniques. At
least 10 of them have now reported outbreaks of the
avian flu.
When huge numbers of chickens or pigs
are reared in densely packed sheds with poor
ventilation, they are vulnerable to infectious diseases
such as cholera, tuberculosis and avian influenza,
experts warn.
Many of these diseases are endemic
in Thailand and China, and recur each year. The real
threat comes when the intensive breeding allows new
varieties to spread quickly and to jump to humans who
live in close proximity to the animals.
A new
strain appears every year and some fear this could start
a pandemic like the influenza that killed millions after
World War I.
The dangers of this new strain of
avian flu virus are still unknown but so far H5N1 has
shown no signs of being able to spread from humans to
humans. All those who have died or fallen sick had been
in close contact with animals. However, in 1997, human
transmission was blamed for six deaths in Hong Kong.
It seems to be spreading fast this time, so that
for the first time since 1925 even Japan has reported an
outbreak.
The crisis-hit nations held emergency
talks in Bangkok on Wednesday, pledging a united front
in the battle against the deadly bird flu. The
conference drew representatives from 13 governments,
including China, the European Union and the United
States.
"The disease in affected countries does
not only severely affect the poultry industry but also
is a potential threat to human health, unless decisive
actions are taken now," said a statement adopted by
officials attending the ministerial meeting.
The
fact that these viruses, and new ones such as SARS, can
evolve all the time makes it difficult to immunize the
animals effectively. Most Thai chickens are immunized
against cholera, for example.
Indonesia now says
it plans to vaccinate its infected flocks rather than
resort to widespread culling. Most countries have
responded by slaughtering all chickens within a
three-kilometer radius of an outbreak.
In China,
among the latest of the countries to report bird-flu
outbreaks, more than 100,000 chicken and ducks have been
culled, according to Xinhua.
H5N1 flu has been
confirmed on a farm in Guangxi province and initial
tests show it has killed poultry on farms hundreds of
kilometers away in Wugang, Hunan province, and in Wuxue,
Hubei province.
China risks losing exports to
Japan and the EU if import bans initiated after the
discovery of the outbreak remain in place. The damage to
China's reputation would also hit other food exports and
affect a tourism industry that has just recovered from
the SARS crisis.
Premier Wen Jiabao and
President Hu Jintao - who is visiting France - have
issued orders that immediate measures be taken to curb
the spread of the disease. "Any epidemic must be
eradicated as soon as it occurs to prevent it
spreading," Xinhua quoted them as saying.
Beijing, a Chinese culinary capital and home to
the Peking duck, has banned the slaughter of poultry in
markets and temporarily suspended the importation of
eggs from other provinces.
China has not
reported any cases of human infection so far, but state
media said on Wednesday that Huang Shengde, owner of the
duck farm in southern Guangxi province where the first
case of bird flu was confirmed, had been placed under
medical monitoring.
China's openness in
recognizing and dealing quickly with the bird-flu
situation is in marked contrast to Beijing's behavior
during last year's outbreak of SARS. During that health
crisis, Chinese officials failed to go public with a
report for months, and consequently earned the wrath of
the international community. This time, the governments
of Thailand and Indonesia are suspected of initially
covering up what has since become a major health and
economic threat to the entire region.
(Inter
Press Service)
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