KANO, Feb 8: The deadly H5N1 bird flu virus has spread to Africa for the first time where it has killed poultry in northern Nigeria, the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) said on Wednesday.
The UN body said it had detected a highly pathogenic form of the virus after testing at a laboratory in the Italian city of Padua. Suspicions about the virus were raised after thousands of chickens died on farms in three northern states of Africa’s most populous country.
Scientists fear that H5N1, which has killed at least 88 people in seven countries since it re-emerged in late 2003, could mutate into a form that passes easily from person to person, sparking a human influenza pandemic.
So far, victims have contracted the disease through close contact with infected birds. Cases of human infection are relatively few compared with the millions of birds that have contracted the disease.
The outbreak could have devastating consequences in Nigeria, where millions keep chickens in their backyards.
“If the situation in Nigeria gets out of control, it will have a devastating impact on the poultry population in the region, it will seriously damage the livelihoods of millions of people and it will increase the exposure of humans to the virus,” said Samuel Jutzi, a director of the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in Rome.
Nigerian Agriculture Minister Adamu Bello said there had not been any poultry workers infected so far. However, it would be difficult for authorities to know this for sure as mortality rates in impoverished Nigeria are among the highest in the world and people are often buried without any formal medical check.
Bello said the government would cull all chickens suspected to be infected with bird flu and quarantine all suspect farms. The government has budgeted between 1.7 and 2.0 billion naira ($13-$15.5 million) in compensation for culled birds.
“The outbreak affected a commercial ... unit kept in battery cages, in Kaduna state (Jaji village), in the northern part of the country,” the OIE said.
Bello said the infected chicken from Kaduna state was first sent for testing on Jan. 16. It came as a day-old chick from a farm in neighbouring Kano state, and another case has been found in Plateau state, which also borders Kaduna, he added.
SPREAD OF VIRUS: Juan Lubroth, senior officer for infectious diseases with the FAO, said the genetic composition of the virus found in Nigeria was similar to the strain detected in Asia and Turkey.
“The fact that the virus is able to spread very rapidly is of great concern,” he said. A team of international experts will travel to Nigeria to advise local authorities.
Bello blamed illegal poultry imports for the outbreak.
In Kano city, farmers were selling chickens at less than half the normal price from farms where birds have been dying.
“I am confused. I lost 10 birds yesterday on my little farm and I cannot afford to lose more, so I came to the market to dispose of many of my birds at these ridiculous prices,” said Ismail Musa.
He was sitting in a crowded Kano market with 10 baskets that each contained about 20 live birds.
Migratory birds have been blamed for the spread of the virus westwards from Asia, but it is not clear how it reached Nigeria, with a poultry population of 140 million, after showing up most recently in eastern Europe, Iraq and Turkey.
Experts said it was important to act quickly to try to contain the virus.
“What is most important now is not how it got into Nigeria but how it can be prevented from leaving Nigeria,” said Associate Professor Phil Hockey, ornithologist at the Percy FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology in Cape Town.
“The prospect of bird flu loose in sub-Saharan Africa is a scary one because of the way that human and domestic bird populations are so closely intermingled,” he said.
Africans normally buy chickens live, often transport them in public transport and kill them at home.
—Reuters
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