March 6, 2007

Kuwait culls 25,000 birds in anti-bird flu campaign 

Some 25,000 birds have been culled ever since bird flu cases escalated in recent weeks.

Some 50 cases of bird flu were confirmed in house pens and small farms in 30 locations around the country, the statement said. Commercial-sized poultry farms were under strict surveillance by health authorities and tested regularly.

The Health Ministry said about 50 cases have been confirmed, but no humans have been infected nor any commercial poultry farms.

Kuwait remains totally free of human cases of bird flu, said spokesman for the joint committee for combating bird flu Dr. Ahmad Al-Shatti.

In light of the increasing number of cases, Al-Shatti said the teams would be expanding their scope of work to other areas and that vet labs would also be beefed up.

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization had warned the bird flu crisis was not short-term, but would remain an urgent issue for several years.

The first H5N1 strain infections in the recent outbreak were announced late February in falcons, turkeys, and chicken. Before that, only one case of the deadly strain had been registered in Kuwait, when it was found on a migrating flamingo in 2005.

The Kuwait Zoo and the bird markets have been closed down while all imports and exports of birds were banned as precautionary measures to prevent the spread of the disease.