ROMANIA: Romania has found bird flu in three dead ducks in the vast Danube Delta wetland, but is waiting to discover whether the virus that killed them is harmful to humans.
Agriculture minister Gheorghe Flutur said yesterday that samples had been sent to the UK amid fears that the birds carried the H5N1 avian flu virus, which has infected over 100 people in Asia since late 2003, killing more than 60 of them.
If confirmed, it would suggest H5N1 is spreading west from Russia, and would heighten fears that the virus could mutate into a devastating form of human flu.
Mr Flutur established a three-kilometre quarantine zone around the peasants' yard where the ducks were found, and ordered a cull of all domestic poultry in the area.
To stop people handling birds he also banned hunting across the delta, a Unesco World Heritage Site and Biosphere Reserve of fish-and insect-rich marshes, which host thousands of migrating birds every spring and autumn.
Romania is already vaccinating residents of the Danube Delta against regular flu. "We are in the phase of suspicion," said Gabriel Pedoi, a senior health official. "We are trying to isolate the virus and are taking all measures to isolate the disease."
The head of Romania's veterinary watchdog, Ion Agafitei, said the results of the analysis should be available from the British lab in a couple of days. Other officials said the samples were dispatched to the UK after the birds were found dead in late September. "We may find a less risky strain [ than H5N1], or a more dangerous one," he said.
The alert in Romania came as Russia scaled down its precautions against the spread of H5N1, which was officially registered in Siberia and the Ural mountains, as well as in neighbouring Kazakhstan. Since Russia discovered the outbreak in July, over 12,000 wild and domestic birds have died from the disease and 144,000 have been culled.
"The outbreak is petering out, as migrant fowl leave the country," said Ivan Rozhdestvensky, Russia's deputy chief veterinarian. "However, we will have to see what happens when. . .birds return next spring."
Many migrating birds from Russia rest and feed in the Danube Delta - where the River Danube merges with the Black Sea - on their way south for the winter. Its remoteness, 3,500 sq km size and the fact that many of its bird inhabitants are protected species, will all complicate Romania's task of protecting against, or controlling, bird flu.
Romania has banned poultry imports from Russia and 14 other countries, and ordered all cars and trucks coming from neighbouring Moldova and Ukraine to be disinfected before crossing the border. The H5N1 virus exists naturally in waterfowl, and does not usually cause them disease, but it kills domestic fowl and poultry when it spreads to them.
Officials from 80 countries gathered in Washington yesterday to discuss how to combat a potentially deadly flu pandemic, as experts warned that the H5N1 virus was steadily mutating, and could ultimately claim as many victims as the Spanish flu outbreak of 1917-18, which killed millions of people.
Minister for Agriculture Mary Coughlan this week said an early warning system, where increased or unusual patterns of wild bird mortality in Ireland are observed, has been introduced by the Department of Agriculture.
