March 23, 2007

 

EU does not need to vaccinate poultry

 

 

Europe does not need a preventive vaccination of poultry to fight bird flu as it has adequate control and response systems, a top United Nations veterinary expert said Thursday (Mar 22).

 

Preventive vaccination has been suggested in scientific circles in Europe after thousands of poultry were culled and sales plunged in many European countries last year in the aftermath of outbreaks in several countries.

 

However, the chief veterinary officer at the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Joseph Domenech said there was no reason to implement costly and logistically difficult preventive vaccination in Europe. Moreover, the region's farms have learned to react quickly and efficiently to bird flu outbreaks.

 

Vaccination is a powerful tool to control bird flu but it has to be used when there is an urgent need, such as a high risk of spreading to humans, especially in endemic countries with a lot of outbreaks, Domenech said.

 

A country with very few outbreaks or no outbreaks at all would not need vaccination, he said.

 

Still, the risk of the virus entering Europe from other continents remained, especially from Africa where bird flu has been permanently present in some countries.

 

Only two EU countries, the Netherlands and Germany has carry out preventive vaccination and less than 0.1 percent of all EU poultry has been vaccinated.

 

As for Asia, he noted that Vietnam has made significant progress in vaccination and may be a model for Indonesia and other countries.

 

He noted that poultry vaccination efforts in Indonesia is still running into huge problems reaching remote villages. Its efforts also require financial support from donors, he said.

 

A successful vaccination campaign in China has helped the country to be dropped from the list of endemic areas, Domenech said.