Avian influenza returns to India, Bhutan

New cases of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) have been confirmed at a zoo in India and among poultry on a farm in Bhutan.

Bugdog, Freeimages.com
Bugdog, Freeimages.com

New cases of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) have been confirmed at a zoo in India and among poultry on a farm in Bhutan. Based on reports received by the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), the disease appears to have been brought under control following previous outbreaks in Africa, Iraq and France.

India, Bhutan on heightened avian flu alert

Last week, Indian media reported the deaths of a number of birds at a zoo in New Delhi, prompting widespread testing that confirmed the disease as the cause of mortality of several storks at Gwalior Zoo in Madhya Pradesh in central India.

According to India Live Today, there have also been cases in Rajasthan in the north-west of the country, which borders Pakistan and Madhya Pradesh. The Kerala government has warned poultry farmers to be on alert for signs of the disease. So far, there have been no reported cases of flu of avian origin in people.

Following previous outbreaks of the disease earlier this year, the authorities declared that India was free of avian flu just last month.

After an absence of around 11 months, H5N1 HPAI has returned to Bhutan, to Chukha district in the south-west of the country, the veterinary authority has reported to OIE. Of a mixed backyard flock of around 3,000 birds at Alubari, 13 poultry died and a further 61 have been destroyed. The outbreak appears to be confined to an “isolated pocket” of birds, as no further infections have been detected during the testing of nearby flocks.

One week ago, reports were received about of new outbreaks of HPAI in Laos, Indonesia and Taiwan.

No new outbreaks of avian flu reported in African poultry

Veterinary authorities in Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Togo and Cameroon continue to provide the OIE with regular updates following outbreaks of HPAI caused by the H5N1 virus variant earlier this year, but none has reported an outbreak for the last 2-3 months.

Iraq too has had no further cases since mid-July following a series of 11 H5N1 outbreaks in poultry in the regions of Baghdad and neighboring Wasit, in which more than 2.8 million birds died or were destroyed as a result of the disease.

France aims for AI freedom; German zoo birds succumb

The duck and goose sector in south-west France was hard hit by HPAI of the H5N1, H5N2 and H5N9 subtypes for several months from November of 2015. There were a total of 81 confirmed outbreaks. Control zones are still in place but, providing the viruses are not detected in the meantime, the authorities expect to be able to declare the country free of HPAI in early December. Two forms of low-pathogenic avian influenza (LPAI) – H5N2 and H5N3 – were also detected during the period of outbreaks but not in recent months and the end of the year is the target for a declaration of freedom from this form of the disease.

Last week, Stuttgarter Zeitung reported that two pheasants had died from a low-pathogenic form of the H7N3 virus subtype at a park in Mannheim, Germany, and that a further 34 birds had been culled as a precaution against further spread of the disease.

Allaying unfounded overreaction to the news, the Stuttgart agriculture ministry described the outbreak as a “local event.”

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