Infectious Diseases 2004

Vietnam reports 28th human avian influenza case; A 16-year-old girl from southern Vietnam has become infected with the avian influenza H5N1 strain. The girl, from the southern Mekong Delta province of Dong Thap, was in critical condition and on a respirator at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City, hospital deputy director Dr. Tran Tinh Hien said. Vietnam has suffered recurring outbreaks of the disease in chicken farms - most recently in southern provinces - since a big wave of infections sickened poultry across much of Asia earlier this year.

Information received on 28 December 2004 from Dr Masako Kurimoto, Director of Animal Health and Animal Products Safety Division, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Tokyo: Date of the report: 27 December 2004. Nature of diagnosis: clinical and laboratory (haemagglutination inhibition test, virus isolation). Location of the outbreak: Fukuoka prefecture (in the southern part of the country). Description of affected population: chickens in a commercial farm. Number of animals in the outbreak: approximately 100,000. Number of deaths: 2,551. Laboratory where diagnosis was made: Fukuoka chuo Livestock Hygiene Service Center, Fukuoka Prefecture. Source of agent / origin of infection: unknown. Control measures: on-site investigations have been made on commercial farms within a 3-km radius from the infected farm and on the breeding farm where infected chickens were born; quarantine;

The European Union Thursday suspended all imports of live poultry from Bulgaria after an outbreak of a highly contagious avian disease in the EU candidate country. The EU's executive commission said the outbreak of Newcastle disease in backyard poultry (448 chickens - stamping out was applied on 16 December 2004) had been confirmed in the region of Kardjali, near Bulgaria's borders with Greece and Turkey.

A suspected case of the low pathogenic avian influenza virus has been found at a duck farm in Gwangju (some 330 kilometers south to Seoul). The ministry said that it has destroyed and buried the ducks (About 9,000 ducks) in the farm in question and have set up tougher quarantine inspections in Gwangju. The quarantine authorities found the H5N2 strain of avian influenza on Dec. 1 when they inspected the farm in the South Korean city, according to Kim Chang-seob, the director of the ministry's animal health division. It appears to be the first case of the H5N2 virus in South Korea.

Japan today reported its first human case of avian influenza after a man working with infected poultry in western Kyoto caught the disease, the Associated Press reported, citing the nation's Health Ministry.

About 4,000 chickens have either died or or been culled in southern Vietnam after showing symptoms similar to avian influenza, many of them found to have contracted the virus strain of H5.

Four employees of an avian influenza contaminated poultry farm and one person who helped disinfect the facility may have contracted the virus during an outbreak early this year (Febfuary 2004) in Japan. If confirmed, the cases would mark the first human infections from avian influenza in Japan. The five were based in rural Kyoto prefecture (state), about 370km west of Tokyo, which suffered an avian influenza outbreak after a farmer tried to cover up the fact the disease was killing thousands of his chickens.

Avian influenza has broken out in several parts of West Nusa Tenggara (NTB - eastern Indonesia), killing thousands of birds in the provincial capital of Mataram. The Mataram agriculture and animal husbandry office said that more than 20,000 birds, or 43 percent of the poultry population in 10 out of the 23 subdistricts in the city, had been infected by the Avian Influenza virus.

A grey heron found in Hong Kong earlier has been confirmed an H5N1 avian influenza, and further tests are underway for the nature of the virus, the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department said Saturday. The department collected the bird in Lok Ma Chau on Dec. 3. Appearing to be sick at the time, it was sent to the New Territories North Animal Management Center for isolation and observation. It died the following day. As a precautionary measure, Hong Kong´s Center for Health Protection has traced all six staff who had contact with the bird, and found they are in good health. Their medical condition will be monitored over the next few days.

Veterinarians have controlled an outbreak of Newcastle disease [NCD] in wild birds in the Chudovskom area of the Novgorod region. This information was released by the regional veterinary directorate to Novosti's correspondent on 8 Dec 2004. The 1st mortalities of wild birds in the city of Chudovo and in the suburban settlement Korpovo were recorded by veterinarians in October 2004. City pigeons were the species predominantly affected. Laboratory analyses have established that the cause of death was NCD, a list A disease of avians livestock.

More than 2 000 ostriches will have to be culled on three farms at Graaff-Reinet, in the Eastern Cape, as a precaution against the spread of avian flu after birds on one of the farms contracted the disease. The department of agriculture says the latest outbreak is probably as a result of an exchange of birds in the area. It has been monitoring one of the farms for some time and the ostriches on two neighbouring farms will also be killed as a precautionary measure. The ostrich farming industry suffered a blow in August when the virus was discovered on farms in the Grahamstown district and at Middleton near Somerset East.

Panic has gripped a central Thailand village after hundreds of pigeons found dead at two local schools were found to have died of avian influenza. Hundreds of pigeon carcasses were found at Sri Saliam primary school and nearby Thung Saliam kindergarten in Sukhothai's Thung Saliam district on Nov 5. But panic broke out only after the cause of death was confirmed by a provincial science centre on Wednesday.

A dead gray heron found in Hong Kong near the mainland China border was found to have the H5N1 avian influenza virus. The gray heron recently found dead in the Lok Ma Chau area near the mainland China border tested positive for H5N1.

A 14-year-old girl was confirmed on Monday as being the 12th person in Thailand to die this year from avian influenza (onset: Oct 8, 2004; outcome: died, Oct 19, 2004)

October 2004, a Thai man traveling from Bangkok to Brussels was apprehended by customs officials at Brussels international airport, and found to be illegally carrying two mountain hawk eagles (Spizaetus Nipalensis) in his hand luggage. These birds were wrapped in a cotton cloth, with the heads free, and inserted headfirst in a bamboo tube around 60 cm in length, with one end (the feet end) open. The two tubes were in a kind of sports bag, with the zip not totally closed to allow some air to enter. The birds were immediately put into quarantine at the airport. They later tested positive for avian influenza H5N1, which is currently circulating widely in southeast Asia, and were euthanised. The H5N1 diagnosis was made using a hemagglutination inhibition test using monospecific polysera and confirmed by H5 specific polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Sequencing is ongoing. The high pathogenicity of the virus was confirmed using the intravenous pathogenicity index. The intravenous pathogen

An influenza virus-like isolate was obtained from specimen of a tiger died of high fever, anorexia and twitch. This virus was confirmed to be influenza virus by characteristics of its morphology, physiochemistry, biology and serology. Further analysis was performed by amplification of the specific nucleic acid of influenza virus nucleoprotein gene. A 464 bp cDNA fragment being amplified from both the virus cell culture and the suspension of specimens, was compared with the published sequences of influenza virus type A, B, C with the homology of 84.9%, 35.0%, 24.8% respectively, indicating that the virus is an influenza virus type A isolate. This virus has been designated as A/tiger/Harbin/01/2002. Three 3-month-old domestic cats were infected with the virus by intravenous inoculation.

The tigers died with flu-like symptoms at the Sri Racha Tigers Zoo, in central Chonburi province, 50 miles (80km) from Bangkok. The total number of dead tigers reached 30. The test on the dead tigers showed they were infected with the H5N1 virus. It's suspected that the tigers were infected by being fed with chicken carcass, and related investigation is being conducted. Some 30 tigers infected with bird flu virus were culled to curb further spread of the epidemic.

Srilueng-On, is the third person to have died from the H5N1 virus since July, when the government confirmed the reappearance of the virus in Thailand. (She developed symptoms on 23 September, was hospitalized on 27 September, and died of severe respiratory disease on 3 October) The health ministry also found the avian influenza virus in dogs in Prachin Buri province, 140 kilometers east of Bangkok.

A 9-year-old girl in northern Thailand has tested positive for avian influenza, becoming the latest human case of the deadly virus since it resurfaced in Southeast Asia in July, a health ministry official said Sunday. Kanda Srilueng-On, who is in critical condition, is believed to have contracted the disease from infected birds.

Vietnam's Ministry of Health has confirmed the death of a 14-month-old infant early this month was caused by avian influenza infection. This is the third death due to avian influenza virus in Vietnam since August.

Thailand on Tuesday morning confirmed infection of avian influenza virus was the cause of a woman's death, the 10th death of the epidemic in the kingdom. The 26-year-old woman identified as Pranee Krongkaew is confirmed to have contracted the deadly H5N1 virus. Pranee died on Sept. 20 after briefly taking care of her deceased daughter Sakuntala, who was also on the list of suspected avian influenza infection cases. The cause of her 11-year-old daughter's death has yet to be confirmed. Pranee's sister Pranom was also confirmed Monday as suffering from avian influenza. She is now recovering, according to the Thai PublicHealth Minister Sudarat Keyurapan.

A 32-year-old Thai woman was today confirmed to be suffering from avian influenza, the second confirmed human case of the disease since the country's latest outbreak started in July. The woman, identified only as Pranom, was confirmed to have the H5N1 virus but her condition was improving. Nine people have died of avian influenza in Thailand, including an 18-year-old man last month, in the latest round of the disease that began in July. Eight other people died earlier in the year. Although she is believed to have come in contact with chickens authorities are still investigating the possibility that she got the disease through human-to-human transmission.

A new pocket of avian influenza was discovered among ostriches (4,000) on a farm near Fort Brown - South Africa. Blood tests on the birds had confirmed the presence of the virus and many of them were showing symptoms of the disease. The Fort Brown farm had exchanged birds with farms in the area of the original outbreak near Somerset East prior to the quarantine measures and had initially been linked to the first farms by the department’s forward and backward tracing system.

Cambodia detected new cases of avian influenza in a province near the capital. The new outbreak of avian influenza in chicken, was detected in a farm in Kien Svay district in Kandal province. The farm near the Cambodian capital was closed after about 2,300 chickens died of the disease. Testing by the Pasteur Institute in Phnom Penh confirmed the bird flu strain of H5N1.

Ag Forte, an Aurora-based poultry company, has quarantined and will slaughter a flock of 14,000 turkeys after the birds tested positive for a strain of avian influenza. The strain of avian influenza virus detected is H3N2. This strain is considered low pathogenic. The avian influenza showed up in routine blood tests that are required by the Department of Agriculture. The affected turkeys in Missouri were breed stock for Ag Forte, a company that produces turkey eggs, hatches those eggs and sells the poults, to other companies. This low-pathogenic avian influenza strain is usually found among swine.

The mass deaths of birds at Lake Koronia in the north of Greece, which initially had been treated by news broadcasts as a mysterious pathological phenomenon, is turning into a massive ecological disaster with incalculable consequences for rare and protected species "an ecological catastrophe". The disaster has wiped out 29 kinds of birds, only four of them game (the lake is a hunting area), while many are endangered species that are endemic to the wetlands of northern Greece. This is also the migratory season, with many species flying over to Africa, and the lake is a stopping point for a large number of birds.

Thailand's Ministry of Health reported today 1 recent human death caused by avian influenza A (H5N1). The case was an 18-year-old male, who had been exposed to sick chickens. He raised 30 fighting cocks in his back yard and was from Prachinburi Province in eastern Thailand, a region which earlier this year experienced confirmed H5N1 outbreaks in poultry. He was admitted to hospital on 5 Sep 2004 and died from acute respiratory distress on 8 Sep 2004.

Indonesia has confirmed recent cases of the highly contagious poultry virus Newcastle disease among chickens in Central Java province, an agriculture ministry official said on Tuesday.

Officials were cited as saying Tuesday that a 14-month-old baby boy in Vietnam has died from suspected avian influenza despite claims by the government that the deadly disease has been brought under control. Nguyen Duc Long, deputy director of the Ministry of Health's legal department, was cited as saying that the baby, who was hospitalised in Hanoi on August 28 and then transferred to the Central Pediatric Hospital for specialist care, died on Sunday, adding, "The baby tested positive for Type A H5 virus, but this is not bird flu."

Livestock officials in western Thailand are planning to kill a flock of more than 1,000 ibises, wild long-billed wading birds found mainly in tropical regions, in their latest bid to contain the spread of avian influenza.

Potentially alarming findings on the avian influenza epidemic currently sweeping southeast Asia went largely unnoticed because they were published in Chinese-language journals, it emerged last week. Chinese researchers reported this January that the strain of the avian influenza virus H5N1, had infected pigs. Yet neither the World Health Organization (WHO) nor the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) was aware of the results when they were published. Last week both groups were hurriedly trying to get the papers translated. The findings became widely known only when an author on the papers, virologist Chen Hualan of Harbin Veterinary Research Institute in northeast China, presented them at the International Symposium on the Prevention and Control of SARS and Avian Influenza in Beijing on 20 August. The results, which show that the virus was found in 2003 in pigs in southeast China, were originally published in January (L. I. Haiyan et al. Chin. J. Prev. Vet. Med. 26, 1-6; 2004).

About 47,000 chickens were destroyed at a farm in southern Sweden Wednesday. Routine tests had found that at least one of the birds had salmonella, a bacteria that can cause illness in humans who consume the infected poultry. It's the first case of salmonella bacteria found in Swedish poultry this year, and only the third case since 1999, said Pia Gustafsson, a veterinarian with the Swedish Board of Agriculture.

In June 2003, the Dutch national Salmonella centre reported a significant excess isolation rate of Salmonella enteritidis when compared with earlier years in most regional public health laboratories. By the end of 2003, this amounted to an extra 540 laboratory confirmed cases for the whole of the Netherlands, which implies an estimated 7500 extra cases of gastroenteritis caused by S. enteritidis in the general population, an increase of 50% on previous years.

Hundreds of birds were gassed and their carcasses burned to contain the outbreak (Date of initial detection of animal health incident: 17 August Estimated date of primary infection: 7 August). one flock of village chicken consisting of 60 birds of mixed ages reared in free-range were found to be infected with the deadly strain in Malaysia's avian influenza outbreak.

South African avian influenza outbreak spreads to more ostrich farms, forcing the slaughter of several thousand more birds. Culling started on the two original farms in the Somerset East area a week ago but the agriculture ministry has said as many as 30,000 ostriches could be put down in a 30-kilometre (18-mile) radius.

South Africa has stopped all poultry exports as a precaution after the outbreak of avian influenza on two farms in the Eastern Cape. The department of agriculture says it has voluntarily stopped poultry exports until the outbreak has been dealt with conclusively. Final tests earlier revealed that the strain, which caused the outbreak, could not spread to humans and poultry. The variant is different from the one that killed millions of birds and 24 humans in Asia earlier this year.

The South African Agriculture Ministry has isolated three farms in the province, restricting the transport of ostriches and ostrich-based products from these farms. Authorities of Western Cape province has banned Eastern Cape farmers from selling ostriches to abattoirs in their province until the epidemic is under control.

A 52-week-old commercial broiler breeder flock with about 24 000 birds (the affected farm is made up of two poultry houses with only 12,000 chickens each) was depopulated and buried Thu 27 May 2004, on a commercial poultry farm in Hopkins County in northeast Texas, near Sulphur Springs. Routine blood tests indicated that the flock, which lays eggs for hatching, had the H7N3 subtype of avian influenza (AI). The National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa, has reported the evidence of the H7N3 AI virus in the flock, but it may be a week or 10 days before virus isolation results are available. "There has been very little evidence of clinical signs of disease or increased mortality in the flock, leading us to believe this may be low-pathogenic AI, which causes little death loss in birds," said Dr. Bob Hillman, Texas state veterinarian and executive director for the Texas Animal Health Commission (TAHC), the state's livestock and poultry health regulatory agency.

Canada said on Monday it would slaughter some 19 million chickens, turkeys and other poultry in British Columbia's Fraser Valley to halt the spread of avian influenza. Agriculture Minister Bob Speller ordered the cull on the recommendation of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), "to stop the spread of this disease and to stamp it out." He said he was working on a compensation package for farmers.

Officials with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) say the bird flu has has been spreading much more quickly than they anticipated, and has hit more farms in the Fraser Valley than anyone suspected. Avian influenza has been now diagnosed on 18 B.C. farms. That's more than twice the number of sites previously known to have been infected. Sixteen of them are within the 10-kilometre surveillance zone in Abbotsford, and the other two are close by. Despite the rapid spread of the disease, the CFIA says it's still too early to hold a mass cull across the Fraser Valley and the Lower Mainland.

A second farmworker in the Fraser Valley has been diagnosed with Avian influenza by the B.C. Centre for Disease Control. BCCDC spokesperson Dr. Danuta Skowronksi says it's a worker who health officials had previously identified with mild illness in connection with the outbreak. She says both infected workers are now fully recovered from mild flu symptoms. Dr. Skowronski says up to 12 people who came in close contact with infected birds have shown signs of the H7 strain - and that the BCCDC is still waiting for more test results.

A person who handled dead chickens on a Fraser Valley farm contracted the avian influenza virus. It may be the first time the virus has been detected in humans in Canada. The man in question was working for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. He developed conjunctivitis, or pink eye, as a result of the virus, but quickly recovered. Several others who had contact with dead chickens after visiting quarantined Matsqui-area poultry barns are being checked for avian influenza.

As many as 275,000 chickens and turkeys will be slaughtered in an effort to contain an outbreak of avian influenza at a number of British Columbia poultry farms. Poultry producers outside a five-kilometre zone affected by bird flu asked Ottawa on Wednesday to cull all the birds within the zone, hoping to protect their flocks and industry by killing off every bird at 21 farms in the Fraser Valley.

The Dutch government has ordered some 1000 birds culled at a farm in the south, the 3rd time in a week that tests have shown signs of antibodies to a mild strain of avian influenza. The farm in Steenbergen had links to a farm in Lopik, in the centre of the country, where the authorities on Wed, 16 Mar 2004, ordered the culling of 600 ducks, after antibodies showed up that could indicate the birds were in contact with the contagious virus. The ministry suspected the antibodies developed after the 2 farms had imported ducks. "The source may have been 2 shipments of a total of 2500 ducks from abroad. We suspect that they may have been carriers of a low pathogenic strain of the virus," Nienke van der Zee, a spokeswoman at the agriculture ministry, said. 5 other farms, which also received ducks from the 2 shipments, are still under investigation. Test results may come on Friday or over the weekend, Van der Zee said. She declined to identify the country that had exported the duc

The Dutch government has ordered the culling of 600 ducks on a farm after routine blood tests showed signs of antibodies to a mild strain of bird flu, the agriculture ministry said late on Monday.

About 22,000 chickens were slaughtered in a precautionary cull on Saturday at a poultry farm in in Eesmond,province of Groningen,north-east Netherlands, on suspicions they were infected with a mild variant of the avian influenza virus.

Since the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) announcement on February 23 of low pathogenic avian influenza (LPAI) on a Fraser Valley, B.C. farm, ongoing tests have been performed as a part of the CFIA's investigation. These tests now indicate that both low and high pathogenic (HPAI) forms of the H7N3 virus were present on the same farm. The high pathogenic virus was only found in the second barn containing the younger birds. The presence of both forms of the virus on the same premise is not unheard of but is rare. This ongoing testing indicated that the virus was in the process of changing from low to high pathogenic in these younger birds.

The first case of avian influenza in Maryland was found Saturday on a commercial chicken farm on the state's Eastern Shore. Four other states have been affected by bird flu. Mild H7 strains of the flu were found in Delaware and New Jersey last month, along with a different H2 strand in Pennsylvania. A highly pathogenic strain of avian influenza was found in Texas last month. It was the same strain found last month in two flocks in Delaware (H7N2), but officials said, "there is no known connection between the Maryland and Delaware cases." The H7 strain was found among samples sent to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's veterinary lab in Iowa from the Delaware laboratory testing chickens from farms in the Delmarva area.

Chicken pathogenicity testing (IVPI) indicates the virus detected in Texas (H5N2) to be non-pathogenic to chickens. On 23 February, National Veterinary Services Laboratory (NVSL) completed genetic sequencing of samples from the affected Texas flock.

Tests showed that a third outbreak of avian influenza in Japan had likely spread further as chickens were shipped from a suspect farm even while birds were dying off in their thousands. The birds were shipped to a Hyogo processing plant from the Asada Nosan Funai Nojo farm in Tanba town, Kyoto prefecture, on Wednesday and Thursday. On those days 9,300 birds at the farm had dropped dead.

About 28,000 chickens have died in the past week at a chicken farm in the town of Tamba, Kyoto Prefecture, and preliminary tests have found five birds positive for avian influenza. The farm, one of the largest in the prefecture, did not report to the authorities until the prefectural government contacted it the same day after having received anonymous tips. The Asada Nosan Funai Nojo farm also shipped around 15,000 live chickens to slaughter houses in nearby prefectures on Wednesday and Thursday while thousands were dying, according to prefectural officials.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has announced that the case of H5N2 avian influenza (AI) in a live-bird market supply flock in Texas reported last week has been characterized as highly pathogenic avian influenza, the 1st such case in the United States in 20 years.

Human Canadians ill after avian influenza alert. Five people on a farm in British Columbia on Canada's west coast, where avian influenza was discovered this week, had fallen ill with flu-like symptoms, government officials said today.

A single case of bird flu has turned up in a flock of 7,000 chickens in south Texas. The strain in animals on the farm in Gonzales County, in south Texas about 50 miles east of San Antonio, was identified as H5N2.

The National Veterinary Services Laboratory (NVSL) in Ames, Iowa has confirmed the presence of strain H2N2 in the commercial layer flock in Mount Joy, Lancaster County.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has received test results confirming the presence of the H7 avian influenza virus on a farm in British Columbia. Further testing will confirm whether the virus is a low or highly pathogenic version of the virus. Initial test results from a provincial laboratory in B.C. detected the avian influenza virus and the H7 subtype was confirmed at the CFIA’s National Centre for Foreign Animal Diseases in Winnipeg.

Japan's Agriculture Ministry confirmed the nation's second outbreak of avian influenza on Tuesday after the deaths of seven chickens on the southern island of Kyushu (in Kyushu's Oita prefecture - green). Japan's first case of the disease was in January at a farm in Yamaguchi prefecture (red) at the southern end of the main island of Honshu. The two locations are separated by a narrow body of water.

More than 20 countries have banned imports of some or all U.S. poultry due to the discovery of the avian influenza virus in three U.S. states. State animal health officials have reported mild strains of the avian influenza virus in Delaware (H7N2), New Jersey (H7N2) and Pennsylvania (H2N2). The United States exports about 15 percent of its chicken production, earning some $2 billion a year in revenue.

The strain was identified as H2N2. The Pennsylvania infection was found during routine tests of a flock of nearly 500,000 egg-producing hens in Mount Joy, Pa., which was immediately quarantined. The birds have not shown visible signs of the disease.

A strain of avian influenza has been found at four live chicken markets in northern New Jersey, just days after outbreaks at two farms in Delaware led to the destruction of thousands of birds. Officials said the strain found in New Jersey is the same one found at two farms in Delaware since last week. This Avian Influenza strain H7N2, has been found among birds in northeastern U.S. markets since 1994. It was also recorded in poultry in Pennsylvania during 1997, 1998; in Virginia an North Carolina in 2002 and in broilers in Pennsylvania in November 2001- January 2002.

Norwegian veterinarians said tests on a wild duck had found a "benign" version of the avian influenza virus sweeping Asia. Stein Ivar Ormsettroe, a director at the Norwegian Food Safety Authority, said the virus had minor symptoms and was probably not even deadly for the infected bird. Veterinarians detected the virus after testing both wild birds and poultry late last year. Authorities revealed the results on Thursday after completing the analysis of the tests.

USA authorities destroyed a flock of nearly 74,000 chickens after confirming a second case of Avian influenza in Delaware state. The latest infection was found in a flock of 73,800 roaster-type chickens in the eastern state's Sussex county. All of the four-and-a-half-week-old birds were destroyed the same day. The two affected farms are about five miles (eight kilometers) apart. Several countries, including Russia, South Korea, Japan and Poland, banned imports of US chickens following Delaware's first case of bird influenza. China suspended US poultry imports following Tuesday's US case.

Delaware state officials ordered the destruction of some 12,000 chickens Friday on a farm that ships the birds to New York City after confirming the flock has been infected by avian influenza.