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Bird flu to shake up Asian
society
By Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK - A year after triggering alarm
bells across Asia, the lethal bird-flu virus is
showing little signs of slowing down, consequently
forcing health and food experts to concede that
the disease will persist for years in the region.
That prognosis, made at a just-concluded
international meeting on bird flu in Vietnam, is
also expected to shake up distinct features of
Asian societies, such as the ubiquitous wet
markets that abound in small towns and even major
cities, like Bangkok.
In these open
markets that are a favorite draw, fresh vegetables
and fruits are sold along with live poultry and
freshly slaughtered chickens. In some markets, the
meat section includes animals and birds from the
wild.
Also vulnerable in this age of bird
flu is another slice of life common in rural parts
of Asia - free-ranging farming, where chickens and
ducks are raised in open backyard farms and, at
times, in close proximity to pigs and other
animals.
At the bird-flu meeting, which
ran from Wednesday to Friday last week in Ho Chi
Minh City, leading public health experts came
close to calling for an overhaul of such
environments in favor of secure and hygienic
options for the breeding and sale of poultry.
"We should examine the risk from dangerous
agricultural practices, such as raising chickens,
ducks, pigs and other animals together - often in
unsanitary conditions and normally with no
barriers between them and humans," Dr Shigeru Omi,
head of the World Health Organization's (WHO)
Western Pacific division, told the conference.
"Another example is wet markets, where
animals that would not normally encounter each
other in the wild are kept in close proximity to
each other and are often slaughtered on the spot -
normally with very little regard for hygiene," he
added.
The call to re-examine such
practices arises from the deadly avian-flu virus
being transmitted in places where free-range
chickens abound. Initially it was suspected that
migratory birds - on their annual flight to summer
resting grounds from their winter homelands - were
responsible for the spread of the virus that swept
through Asia last year.
"Current evidence
suggests that trade in live poultry, mixing of
avian species on farms and at live bird markets,
and poor biosecurity in poultry production
contribute much more to disease spread than wild
bird movements," Samuel Jutzi, director of the
Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) Animal
Production and Health Division, told the
conference.
According to the FAO, nearly
140 million birds have been culled or died due to
avian flu over the past year in Asian countries
where the virus has become endemic. These
countries include Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia,
China and Cambodia.
The message from the
conference, together with a plea made by Asian
delegates for the global community to fund the
battle against bird flu in the region, points to a
new level of worry shared by those on the
frontlines to combat the lethal virus.
Chief veterinary officers from 28 Asian
countries that attended the Ho Chi Minh City
meeting said that US$100 million would be needed
in the fight against bird flu. "Many countries
affected by bird flu have limited capacity to
control the virus. They lack effective diagnostic
tools and surveillance systems that are essential
for early warning and timely response," stated an
FAO press release.
The urgent need for
such funds - last year donors only gave $18
million to fight bird flu - was underscored on the
eve of the meeting in Vietnam, when a leading US
public health expert said that bird flu posed the
"most important threat" the world is currently
facing.
At a meeting of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, Dr
Julie Gerberding, director of the US-based Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention, said that the
lethal bird-flu virus had given rise to "a very
ominous situation for the globe".
There
are emerging parallels between the 1918 influenza
pandemic and the current spread of bird flu, she
said. The fear is that the virus will mutate in
such a way that it becomes easier to pass from
human to human, without losing any of its lethal
force.
The 1918 pandemic, which killed an
estimated 50 million people worldwide, followed
the path of its human carriers along trade routes
and shipping lines. Outbreaks swept through North
America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Brazil and the
South Pacific.
Bird flu has killed 46
people - 33 in Vietnam, 12 in Thailand and one in
Cambodia - since an outbreak swept though Asia at
the beginning of 2004. The victims contracted the
disease after coming into contact with infected
chickens or consuming contaminated poultry meat.
Although the bird-flu-related deaths may
appear numerically insignificant, health experts
point to worrying signs that such a limited toll
concedes. For one, more than 70% of those infected
with the H5N1 strain of bird flu have died. The
other is that the human immune system lacks the
capacity to combat a virus that may stem from bird
flu.
Almost a year ago, the WHO pointed
out that the lethal bird-flu virus had the
potential to mutate into one that could be passed
from human to human. That fear has been compounded
by the fact that the world still lacks a potent
vaccine to insulate people from the disease.
According to the WHO's Omi, influenza
pandemics occur every 20 to 30 years. "The last
pandemic was nearly 40 years ago, so, by this
measure, one is now overdue," he said. The last
large flu outbreak in 1968 - the Hong Kong flu -
killed around 34,000 people globally.
(Inter Press Service) |
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