British Say Humans Are Unlikely to Get Bird Flu

Feb 06, 08:29 PM

Current Headlines: By Maria Cheng

Britain is confronting Europe's biggest outbreak of bird flu with a massive slaughter of turkeys, and worried consumers are asking whether the disease will hit humans next.

Experts are trying to spread the word that conditions in Britain are so different from Asia and Africa that the chance of human infection is infinitesimal.

They also stress that no human bird flu cases have ever been traced to eating properly cooked poultry or eggs.

"At the moment in the United Kingdom, the general public still have more chance of winning the lottery than getting bird flu," said Jim Robertson, a virologist at Britain's national institute for biological standards and control.

For Bernard Matthews PLC -- Britain's largest poultry producer whose turkeys were infected by the H5N1 strain at its Suffolk farm - - the economic consequences could be devastating.

It has had to slaughter 159,000 turkeys, and while the company refuses to release a figure, experts say damages could run into the millions of dollars if the problem is not quickly solved.

Sales may also be hurt -- not only at Bernard Matthews but also throughout the poultry industry, worth an estimated $6.7 billion a year in Britain.

Ireland, Russia and Macedonia joined Japan in banning British poultry imports, and the Netherlands and Norway ordered restrictions on commercial poultry over the weekend. Farmers in the Netherlands were told to keep their birds indoors or behind chicken wire and protective netting.

Bernard Matthews has annual sales of $783 million, and like other poultry producers, it is working to reassure consumers that eating fowl is safe.

Three of Britain's major supermarket chains have so far reported no change in poultry or egg sales following the H5N1 outbreak.

But previous bird flu outbreaks in Europe have hit the market hard.

After an outbreak on a French farm last year, poultry consumption in France fell by 30 percent. And in Romania, which has had repeated H5N1 outbreaks, consumption dropped by nearly 80 percent.

A total of 2,500 turkeys were killed last week by the H5N1 virus on the Bernard Matthews farm. Health authorities have imposed restrictions and surveillance zones around the farm, requiring that poultry be isolated from wild birds and restricting movement in and out of the zones.

H5N1 remains primarily an animal disease and has only rarely infected humans. Since the strain began circulating widely in late 2003, hundreds of millions of birds have either died or been slaughtered because of the virus, and millions of people have been exposed.

Monday, Egypt's state-run news agency reported the country's 12th death from bird flu. The victim, a 17-year-old girl from Fayoum, about 45 miles south of Cairo, tested positive for the H5N1 strain, the Middle East News Agency reported.

To date, 165 people have been identified as having died of H5N1, according to the World Health Organization.

While the H5N1 virus found in Britain is similar to that seen recently in Hungary -- and in Asia and Africa -- the resources available to respond to the Suffolk outbreak dramatically reduce the chances of humans getting sick, officials said.

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