More swans test positive for H5N1 bird flu: officials
LONDON (AFP) — Two more wild swans found dead on a nature reserve in south-west England have tested positive for the H5N1 strain of bird flu, which can be deadly for humans, the environment ministry said Friday.
The results bring the total number of swans found to have the disease at the Abbotsbury Swannery, in the Chesil Beach area of Dorset, to nine since the first cases were detected on January 10.
Earlier this week an epidemiology report said the highly virulent strain was most likely to have been introduced by an infected migratory bird and was similar to that found in Europe late last year.
It also said the strain of the virus is similar to those found in Europe in the latter part of last year.
Restrictions on the movement of poultry and wild birds within a 10-kilometre radius of the swannery have been lifted but limits still apply within a three-kilometre zone.
Britain's first case of this deadly strain of bird flu, which has killed more than 200 people worldwide since 2003, was in a dead swan found in a Scottish fishing village in 2006.
About 12 staff at the Abbotsbury Swannery are being monitored for signs of the disease and workers have been given a course of the anti-viral drug Tamiflu as a precaution. But the risk of infection is said to be low.
