Nigeria's bird flu epidemic spreads despite mass culling Fri Feb 17, 6:05 AM ET



KANO (AFP) - Nigerian officials said a deadly strain of bird flu had been detected in another farm and health officials pressed on with mass poultry culling in the ravaged north to prevent the disease from claiming human lives.

ADVERTISEMENT

Ali Hussani Dutsin-Mad, the top health bureaucrat in the the northern state of Katsina, told AFP that the deadly strain of the H5N1 virus that can kill humans had been detected in a second farm near the state capital.

"The poultry farm had 1,000 chickens out of which 300 died of the infection," he told AFP on Friday.

"We culled 700 chickens ... the farm has been closed down and the whole area disinfected."

Kabiru Ali, the top agriculture official of the nearby state of Jigawa -- where a suspected outbreak of bird flu was reported -- said there would be mass culling as a precautionary measure.

"We have ordered for the killing of all chickens in the area where the outbreak has been reported," he said.

Ali however said the planned 250 naira (less than two dollars) compensation to be paid by the federal government for every chicken killed was not enough and said the federal administration would hike the sum.

Nigeria's top veterinary expert Dr Lami Lombin said monitors and experts have fanned out across the sprawling country of 36 states, where bird flu has been confirmed in five northern ones.

"We are going round the country for screening to ensure consumer confidence," she told AFP, adding that President Olusegun Obasanjo's farm had also been checked on Thursday.

"The president's farm is not exempted. In this situation no-one is exempted. We take sample of the birds for testing," she said.

Daniel Atsu, managing director of Obasanjo Holdings Ltd, said the president's poultry farm with one million chickens and a staff of 4,000, was among the country's seven largest.

"We on the farm know that everything is okay. But there must be a proof that can show to people eating our chickens that they are safe," he told The Guardian newspaper.

Meanwhile, Helder Muteia, the country head of the Food and Agriculture Organisation said the body was trying to trace how the virus entered Nigeria.

He said while there could be several possibilities, the two most probable ways were that "either the virus came with migratory birds, or it was fraudulent importations of birds from Asia," adding: "We expect the results as soon as possible."

Since the outbreak was first detected in Nigeria, tens of thousands of poultry, ducks and ostriches have been culled, burned and buried.

One of the main worries of the government is to prevent the spread of the epidemic to the densely populated south and the economic capital Lagos.

Nigeria on Wednesday banned backyard poultry in the capital Abuja and its surrounds but has so far ignored a call from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation to close meat markets in the northern states of Kano and Kaduna.

Poultry is also freely transported across Africa's most populous nation.

Obasanjo met Wednesday with international donors and announced the formation of a special monitoring cell to track and stem the growing epidemic while pledging to "continue to work until the flu is stamped out."

He also ordered his ministers to work round-the-clock "until the flu is contained."