H5N1 in UK (1 Viewer)

[MKinHK]

More news from HK. A Eurasian Kestrel has been found dead with H5N1.

Anyone care to guess where? Within 1.5 km of the Bird Market. So no surprises there, then.

 

[martintbird]

Lies, damned lies and H5N1

dandare asks:

why DEFRA, MHS or whoever was responsible for previously warning mr Matthews about breaches in hygene, did not make sure that he immediately took action to rectify the problems?

Might also ask why people like David Miliband and certain scientists (yes, step forward John Oxford) so quick to blame wild birds, yet curiously slow to recognise true cause.

In at least some cases, gotta be linked to reasons why Food and Agric Organisation's been so ready to blame wild birds, and do so little public investigation into poultry trade inc smuggling, and feeding of chicken waste to fish (a technique the FAO has promoted; but quietly drawn back from).

ie - Industrial poultry farming is big business. (see, eg, Grain report)
and you can pity the smallholders, sometimes forced to take birds indoors or even close because of threats from the Tooth Fairy Birds.

Interesting, too, that New Scientist has persistently blamed wild birds for spreading H5N1 - a real crap recent article tried to finger them for the Suffolk case. (I'm among a few folk who've tried correspondence with author, but no sense penetrated; instead, conservationists villified.)
Just a coincidence, then, that New Sci publisher just happens to also publish Poultry World, Farmer's Weekly.

Graham: I recalled after my post, that Birdlife is partly constrained by politics.
My dad's emailed that RSPB has been pretty quiet (apparently) re the H5N1 guff in UK. Here, too, surely some politics. Farming lobby not the best one for RSPB to upset.
[Some conservation groups and ornithologists have accepted money for studying links between wild birds and H5N1. For some, must have seemed juicy windfalls.]

Here in HK, following Mike's post, comes news of two more dead munias found in urban Kowloon and being tested for H5N1. One a scaly-breasted - native, but a bird of old rice fields not the city; the other a chestnut munia, which not native to HK but is also traded.
Here, too, wild birds have been readily blamed - indeed, I believe HK was first place to blame wild birds for bringing H5N1 (based on woeful evidence: no certainly migratory birds involved; great majority of dead birds were in captive collections). Govt has closed Mai Po a couple of times, never mind no H5N1 there (fingers crossed!!).
Yet, tackling more powerful bird trade and Buddhist associations - to whom catching wild birds, transporting them in horrendous conditions, then releasing in utterly wrong places brings "merit" - proving too much.

 

[bitterntwisted]

Interesting, too, that New Scientist has persistently blamed wild birds for spreading H5N1 - a real crap recent article tried to finger them for the Suffolk case. (I'm among a few folk who've tried correspondence with author, but no sense penetrated; instead, conservationists villified.)
Just a coincidence, then, that New Sci publisher just happens to also publish Poultry World, Farmer's Weekly.

You think it's sinister? A New Scientist journalist was on the news here, presumably the author of the piece, and she was asked for comment early on in the Matthews case. I was hoepful of a balanced perspective but she smiled, "Well, there's a wildfowl sanctuary just twelve miles away [Minsmere] and I really don't think we need look any further than that." I was utterly gobsmacked and have not bought New Scientist since, but I had thought it was ignorance and not a political agenda.

Graham

 

[martintbird]

Poultry World

Poultry World - from same publisher as New Scientist - website notes:

today it focuses on large scale production and processing of poultry and eggs

- ie the kind of poultry farming that looks responsible for evolution of highly pathogenic avian flus, inc the H5N1 variants of concern; and for sustaining and spreading H5N1.
See, for instance, the Grain report I've mentioned:
Fowl play: The poultry industry's central role in the bird flu crisis

This paper presents a fresh perspective on the bird flu story that challenges current assumptions and puts the focus back where it should be: on the transnational poultry industry.

So, who knows if New Sci journo's daftness is coincidence or not.

 

[martintbird]

Big Chicken on a roll thanks to H5N1

this just in:

GRAIN News Release
14 March 2007

Bird flu: a bonanza for 'Big Chicken'
http://www.grain.org/articles/?id=22

A new report by GRAIN shows how bird flu is being used to advance the
interests of powerful agribusiness corporations.

One year ago, when governments were fixated on getting surveillance
teams into wetlands and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO)
was waving the finger of blame at Asia and Africa's abundant household
poultry, GRAIN and other groups pointed out that large-scale
industrial poultry farms and the global poultry trade were spreading
bird flu -- not wild birds nor backyard flocks. Today, this has become
common knowledge, even though little is being done to control the
industrial source of the problem, and governments still shamelessly
roll out the wild bird theory to dodge responsibility.

However a more sinister dimension of the bird flu crisis is becoming
more apparent. Today, more than ever, agribusiness is using the
calamity to consolidate its farm-to-factory-to-supermarket food chains
as the small-scale competition is criminalised. Meanwhile
pharmaceutical companies mine the goodwill invested in the global
database of flu samples to profit from desperate, captive vaccine
markets. At the centre of this story are two UN agencies (FAO and the
WHO) using their international stature, access to governments and
control over the flow of donor funds to advance corporate agendas.

Quote from the report: "Agribusiness clearly suffers, at least in the
short-term, when bird flu breaks out. But, whether in Indonesia or
Russia, India or Egypt, governments and the various international
agencies have quickly come to the industry's defence, and have even
managed to turn the bird flu crisis into an opportunity for the larger
corporations to consolidate their control over the long term. These
corporations, from CP in Thailand to Tyson in the US, have worked hard
to ensure that this happens."

==============================================

Read more in "Bird flu: a bonanza for 'Big Chicken'", available both
in PDF and as a web page:

In English: http://www.grain.org/articles/?id=22

In Bahasa Indonesia: http://www.grain.org/m/?id=117

The report will soon be available in French and Spanish.

For background information see also the GRAIN "Bird flu resource page"
here: http://www.grain.org/go/birdflu

 

[bitterntwisted]

The New Scientist again leaps to conclusions over the latest European outbreak, repeating conjecture that novel strains arise as "wild birds congregate for the summer moult" http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/mg19526113.800-deadly-flu-flies-in-again-to-europe.html

I'd not bought NS for 4 months in disgust at the last round of coverage - the first copy I buy has this in it! I will be writing to them, asking them to at least consider alternate views. They could start by reading this... http://newsbou.blogspot.com/2007_03_01_archive.html

Graham

 

[MKinHK]

Here's a report from a recent conference held in Scotland that may interest those at New Scientist who still support the global chicken factoryhttp://www.snh.org.uk/press/detail.asp?id=1739.

I think we need to continue to pump out these messages to educate the public and make it harder and harder for the collusion to continue.

 

[martintbird]

New paper on CDC website.

Paper just on CDC site looks at the issue, conclusion much as in Cardona's email.

Abstract:

The claim that migratory birds are responsible for the long-distance spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses of subtype H5N1 rests on the assumption that infected wild birds can remain asymptomatic and migrate long distances unhampered. We critically assess this claim from the perspective of ecologic immunology, a research field that analyzes immune function in an ecologic, physiologic, and evolutionary context. Long-distance migration is one of the most demanding activities in the animal world. We show that several studies demonstrate that such prolonged, intense exercise leads to immunosuppression and that migratory performance is negatively affected by infections. These findings make it unlikely that wild birds can spread the virus along established long-distance migration pathways. However, infected, symptomatic wild birds may act as vectors over shorter distances, as appears to have occurred in Europe in early 2006.

final sentence:

Migratory birds are already affected by habitat destruction and climate change; alarmist statements blaming migrants for the spread of an emerging disease with pandemic potential and ignoring or underplaying the role of the poultry industry do not do justice to the complexity of the issues involved

Ecologic Immunology of Avian Influenza (H5N1) in Migratory Birds

Need more info re Big Chicken? Try this from China:
http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/show/single/en/1096-The-truth-about-dead-chickens