28.03.2006

The Netherlands launched preventive vaccination on Thursday (23/03) for its 1-3 million backyard poultry and about 5 million free-range poultry against the highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza virus after receiving EU permission on Feb. 22.
The main Dutch poultry farmers organisations said most farmers have not started vaccinating because the biggest importer of Dutch poultry, Germany, refuses to buy meat and eggs from vaccinated animals as consumers fear possible health risk.
The Netherlands is a top world poultry exporter with annual sales of 1.5 billion euros ($1.82 billion) and Europe's second biggest producer after France.