September 7, 2006

Poultry deaths from bird flu triple in Indonesian province of West Java

The number of poultry that died of bird flu in West Java over the first eight months of this year has tripled from that of the previous year, Rachmat Setiadi, head of the West Java Animal Husbandry Office, said Tuesday (Sep 5).

West Java, with a population of 39 million and an area the size of the US state of Maryland, has the densest population in the country.

More than 63,000 birds died from the H5N1 virus between January and August this year, compared to about 21,500 last year.

Lax supervision is believed to have led to the spread of the H5N1 virus, from 16 to 20 of the 25 mayoralties and regencies in West Java.

Most of the poultry slaughterhouses in the province are unlicensed, which made disease prevention and monitoring difficult.

Furthermore, there are only two checkpoints to monitor the poultry traffic in and out of the province.

A string of bird flu outbreaks continue in the province, along with human cases.

One of the more serious cases occurred early this year in a farm with 50,000 chickens. It was the only reported case of bird flu among large-scale commercial farms (those with more than 10,000 chickens) in the province.

Estimates put the number of chickens in the province at 31 million, most of them reared near family homes.

Besides ongoing efforts to educate residents about the need to locate chicken coops away from their houses, the animal husbandry office also plans to tighten inspections through the setting up more poultry checkpoints.