Birdflu spreads, World Bank approves funds
ANKARA, Friday (Reuters) - Turkish authorities struggled to contain a
spreading outbreak of avian influenza setting up quarantine zones around
infected areas and sending samples of virus to laboratories for testing
to ensure it is not evolving into a more dangerous form.
Neighboring countries expressed concern the virus might spread to its
poultry flocks. Iraq said it was on high alert, but officials conceded
that poor border controls would make it difficult to enforce a ban on
importing birds.
Global officials said they were gathering steam to help fight the
virus, with the board of the World Bank endorsing $500 million in aid to
help countries hit by the virus or that are at high risk.
The World Health Organization said Turkish officials had now
documented 18 human cases of H5N1 avian influenza infection and said
three children had died. One boy who was found to be infected without
being sick had begun to show symptoms, WHO officials said.
"Human cases have now been reported from nine of the country's 81
provinces," the WHO said in a statement posted on its Web site.
The two newest patients are young children, aged 4 and 6, WHO said.
"Both have a documented history of direct contact with diseased birds,"
it said.
"Altogether, agricultural officials have confirmed poultry outbreaks
in 11 provinces and are investigating possible outbreaks in an
additional 14 provinces across the country."
WHO said its experts were working with Turkish officials to study the
virus and its patterns of attack. More samples of virus were en route to
labs, WHO said.
"These studies should deepen understanding of the epidemiology of the
disease, including the possibility that any human-to-human transmission
may have occurred, the vulnerability to infection of health care workers
and other occupationally-exposed groups, and the possibility that milder
forms of the disease might be occurring in the general population," WHO
said.
The good news was that the virus seems sensitive to the few drugs
available to treat patients, WHO said.
Turkish officials said they had set up a 2-mile (3-km) quarantine
zone around infected areas, and information was being broadcast via
television commercials and vans fitted with loudspeakers. They said they
had culled more than 350,000 birds in the past two weeks.
Fears hit poultry markets. The U.S. Agriculture Department said
chicken meat exports would be 315 million pounds (143 million kg) less
than previously forecast because consumers in Turkey and other countries
affected by the deadly bird flu disease were eating less poultry.
Globally H5N1 has infected 147 people and killed 78 of them,
according to the latest official WHO tally, which includes only four of
the Turkish cases.
Scientists stressed they have no evidence the virus has become more,
and said the same mutation has been seen before without causing a big
outbreak. But it shows the need for careful watching and testing, they
said.
"When we have a child infected we are giving the virus more chance to
adapt to human beings and giving it this chance could help create
conditions of the emergence of a new virus," Rodier said in an
interview.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the U.S. National Institute for Allergy
and Infectious Diseases, said the mutation affected the ability of the
virus to infect cells. "It is really unclear what this means," Fauci
said in a telephone interview.
"This same mutation was identified in 2003 in Hong Kong and yet did
not take off in a way that led to greater transmissibility either from
chicken to human or human to human."
The World Bank was pressing for funding to help the worst-affected
countries cope, and endorsed spending $500 million, ahead of a meeting
of donors next week in Beijing where it was hoped $1 billion more would
be pledged.
World Bank Vice President Jim Adams told Reuters that Kyrgyzstan
would be the first beneficiary and would get $5 million to prepare for
bird flu. He said Turkey could be in line for some money, too. |