Malaysia Confirms Deadly Bird Flu Strain; Culls Birds

A strain of bird flu blamed for 27 deaths in Asia this year has been found in Malaysia, the government said on Thursday, as hundreds of birds were gassed and their carcasses burned to contain the outbreak.

A strain of bird flu blamed for 27 deaths in Asia this year has been found in Malaysia, the government said on Thursday, as hundreds of birds were gassed and their carcasses burned to contain the outbreak.Two chickens that died in a northern village near the Thai border were found to be infected with the deadly strain in Malaysia’s first bird flu outbreak, said Abi Musa Asa’ari Mohamed Nor, secretary-general of the Agriculture Ministry.”The results (from tests of the birds) show they were H5N1, which is pathogenic, which is the dangerous one,” he told reporters in Kuala Lumpur.In Geneva, the World Health Organization called the sudden outbreak of the virus strain in Malaysia “disconcerting” and said there was still the risk it could jump to humans, with pandemic potential.”As long as it circulates in animals, there’s always the possibility, the risk, that it will jump to humans (and) when it jumps to humans there is always the risk of a pandemic development,” said Dick Thompson, spokesman for the U.N. body.Malaysia was now on nationwide alert for bird flu cases but the government had decided against banning poultry exports, Abi said, reversing an earlier statement by a veterinary official. It would be up to other countries to decide whether to buy Malaysian poultry and eggs.The recent deaths of three people in Vietnam have been blamed on the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu. The strain also killed 16 people there and eight in Thailand early this year.Most of this year’s avian influenza cases — including recent outbreaks in China, Indonesia, Canada and South Africa — have been of strains limited to birds.Squawking chickens scampered around the village of Pasir Pekan as health officials wearing masks, gloves and gowns rounded them up and stuffed them into plastic bags, into which carbon dioxide was pumped. The carcasses were burned.Stunned villagers watched, offering no protest as officials culled more than 300 birds, including fighting fowl and magpies.”We accept the decision. We don’t want our birds to cause sickness to anyone,” said 43-year-old Rubiaah Abdullah, who turned in nearly a dozen pets. She said her husband was indoors as he could not bear to watch. HUMANS MONITOREDNo human cases of bird flu had been found in the outbreak in Kelantan state, around 350 km (220 miles) northeast of Kuala Lumpur, officials said.Abi said it was hoped the outbreak would be wiped out within three weeks.”We are confident the outbreak can be confined to the village. We are culling all the animals there. It’s not easy because we have to catch the chickens first. It is a village and we know the chickens there are free roaming,” he said.The World Health Organization says human cases of bird flu have been limited to people living or working in close contact with birds, rather than people who had eaten poultry or eggs.There has been some infection of health workers, but the WHO’s bigger fear is that the virus will mix with human influenza and start a new pandemic that kills millions of people.Singapore, which had been buying more than 100,000 live birds and 2 million eggs a day from Malaysia, banned imports on Wednesday.Dozens of trucks carrying poultry products from Malaysia were turned back at border crossings to the city-state, Malaysia’s national news agency, Bernama, reported.Malaysian officials said the source of the outbreak was not known, but they were eyeing the border with Thailand — the world’s fourth largest chicken exporter until bird flu hit this year, prompting a cull of more than 60 million birds.”We have been on alert ever since the outbreak in southern Thailand. All the more now, we will increase the security along the border,” said Nik Mazian Nik Mohamad, the Kelantan state executive councillor for agriculture.Malaysia said the 1.1 million chickens it produced each day commercially were safe and would stay on sale but it would step up checks on exports.”There is no outright ban, there never was. The onus is on the importing countries, if they still want to buy they can, but on our part we will not let any cargo that we think is contaminated to go through,” Abi said.Japan had already banned Malaysian poultry after a previous suspected case of bird flu. Taiwan banned Malaysian poultry on Thursday. (Source: Reuters, August 2004)