HYDERABAD, March 25: The director of animal husbandry, Sindh, announced here on Friday that the department of poultry production and research had obtained 18,842 poultry samples, both commercial and domestic, from April 2004 till date from Karachi, Hyderabad, Mirpurkhas, Thatta, Dadu, Nawabshah, Sukkur, Larkana, Shikarpur and Khairpur.

He said that these samples were sent to the Poultry Research Institute, Karachi, and the National Reference Laboratory for poultry diseases in Islamabad for bird flu analysis.

He said that no bird flu was discovered in any sample.

He said that not only this but since November 2005 till date, 40 samples of migratory birds were also analysed but no bird flu was discovered.

He said that samples were taken every week from Karachi, Thatta, Hyderabad, Dadu and Mirpurkhas under a comprehensive system which were being regularly analysed in Karachi.

Not only this but all veterinary doctors of the poultry department also visited their areas every week and observed domestic and commercial poultry and informed the Karachi centre in case of any disease.

He said that these doctors also sent samples for analysis.

The director said that trained emergency teams had been provided necessary equipment for visits to Karachi, Hyderabad, Mirpurkhas, Dadu, Sukkur and Naushahro Feroze.

He said that these teams had prepared strategies in coordination with DCOs to check and identify bird flu.

He said that Sindh poultry vaccine centre had prepared certified vaccines of different types and added that 50 million doses of these vaccines had been sent to different parts of the country.

He said that where this vaccine had been used regularly, no outbreak of any poultry disease had been reported during the last three years.