Turkey: Bird Flu Contained
The bird flu outbreak in western Turkey has been contained, the Turkish government said Thursday, urging the public to remain calm amid panic over news that Turkish birds were infected with the virulent H5N1 virus.
Agriculture Minister Mehdi Eker said authorities were on alert for any outbreak in the rest of Turkey, which lies in the path of several migratory birds flying from eastern Russia to Africa.
"We are acting against even the smallest of suspicions," Eker said. "The situation is under control."
The European Union announced earlier Thursday that it found the H5N1 bird flu virus in Turkish poultry — the first confirmation of H5N1 so far west. The virus has killed 60 people in Asia since 2003.
Experts have been tracking the disease in birds because they worry the strain might mutate into a human virus and spark a pandemic. Public health authorities want the poultry outbreaks wiped out as rapidly as possible to prevent opportunities for mutations.
The village outside Balikesir in western Turkey where 1,800 turkeys died last week was under a 2-mile quarantine. The quarantine was to remain in place for three weeks.
Authorities culled 7,600 domestic birds and disinfected 5 hectares of land in the area to contain the highly contagious virus.
Government ministers and other officials raced to reassure the public. "Of course, we need to be careful; we need to do our homework well," said Health Minister Recep Akdag, soon after the announcement was made in Brussels.
"The outbreak in winged animals occurred in one area and has been contained," he said. "Our citizens should not panic."
Eker said eight people were given medication protectively but no one in Turkey has contracted the disease. The quarantine will be lifted at the end of 21 days if no new cases emerge, he said.
Turkey asked the Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche Holding AG for 1 million boxes of a standard flu medicine as a precaution against a possible pandemic, a health official said Thursday.
Health official Turan Bulgaz said Turkey's stockpile of the antiviral oseltamivir, known commercially as Tamiflu, was sufficient, but said a new order had been put in case of a major pandemic.
Turkish authorities believe the turkeys contracted the disease from migratory birds that pass through the Manyas Bird Sanctuary in Balikesir on their way to Africa from the Ural mountains in Russia.
The outbreak of H5N1 began in Asia two years ago. By July, it had spread to the Asian part of Russia. The case in Turkey is disturbing because it shows further spread of the virus westward.
Any time the virus shows up in a new location, it presents more opportunities for it to mutate into a form that could be dangerous to humans.
Experts want to stamp out any outbreak in poultry as quickly as possible to prevent it mutating into a human virus. There are two ways it could mutate: randomly on its own when passing from bird to bird, or by spawning a human pandemic strain by infecting a person who already has normal human flu.
The two viruses could swap genes to produce a dangerous hybrid that has the lethality of the bird virus but the spreadability of the human one.
The European Union on Monday banned imports of live birds and feathers from Turkey. Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Poland, Ukraine and Serbia-Montenegro also banned poultry imports from Turkey.