Wild Birds' Role in HPAI Crisis Confirmed: But Scientific Conference Fingers Poultry Business [FAO Press Release]
PRNewswire (Posted by Yahoo)
06/01/2006
WASHINGTON and ROME, June 1 /PRNewswire/ -- Migrating wild birds have played and will likely continue to play a role in transporting highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) virus, or bird flu, over long distances. This was among the main conclusions of a two-day international scientific conference called by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE).
But the conference, attended by over 300 scientists from more than 100 countries also recognized that the virus was mainly spread through poultry trade, both legal and illegal.
"Several presentations at the Conference, some supported by recent publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals, implicated wild birds in the introduction of HPAI H5N1 virus at considerable geographical distance from known H5N1 outbreaks in poultry," the meeting said in a concluding document.
Pesticides are Poisoning Wildlife, Experts Say: Toxic Agents Find their Way into the Food Chain
Thousand Oaks Acorn
01 June 2006
Michael Picarella
Pesticides will kill pests, but they can also hurt and kill wildlife.
Last year, the National Park Service found two mountain lions ill from rodent poison in the Simi Hills, according to Bonnie Clarfield, National Park Service ranger. More recently, Vallerie Coleman of the Monte Nido community in nearby Malibu Canyon found a bobcat in her yard. The sick cat was also a victim of rodent poison.
The organization WildRescue captured the cat and took it to a Ventura County animal care center. A representative of the wildlife group said the bobcat was emaciated from parasites and had a severe case of mange, an infectious skin disease.
"Treatment and a veterinarian's examination suggested that this young bobcat was suffering from a suppressed immune system due to the ingestion of rodents poisoned by rodenticide," Coleman said.
While the bobcat eventually recovered and was recently released, Coleman researched the dangers of pesticides to wildlife--and people--and is determined to inform people about the dangers.
"Many people resort to rodenticides (baits, tracking powders and fumigants) to control rats, mice and gophers," Coleman said.
"However, humans-especially children-pets and other wildlife, including birds, are frequently (unintended) victims. Although tamper-proof bait stations are recommended, they do not solve the problem since small amounts of bait can be removed and secondary poisoning of non-target predators is a significant danger."
N.D. Tests Don't Detect CWD
Associated Press (Posted by GrandForksHerald.com)
01 June 2006
BISMARCK - Tests of almost 1,600 deer and elk shot during last year's hunting season did not find chronic wasting disease in any animal, the state Game and Fish Department said.
The illness, which affects the brain and nervous system of white-tailed deer, mule deer, elk and moose, never has been detected in North Dakota deer or elk in four years of testing, said Dorothy Fecske, an agency wildlife disease biologist.
Samples from 1,536 deer and 31 elk, which were shot in 25 deer hunting units covering southwestern and eastern North Dakota, were analyzed recently at a Wyoming lab.
UN Agency Plans Bird-Tracking System to Monitor Flu Spread
Bloomberg.com
01 June 2006
June 1 (Bloomberg) -- The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization is proposing a $6.8 million plan to improve the tracking of migrating wild birds, which may play some role in the spread of the deadly H5N1 avian flu virus.
The system would use backpackers, communications satellites and a network of computers to monitor the movements of wild birds on their annual migrations, the organization said today in an e-mailed statement. Improved tracking would ``fill a huge gap'' in knowledge about where, when and how wild birds associated with deadly strains of avian flu migrate.
``All we have now is a snapshot,'' Joseph Domenech, chief veterinary officer of the Rome-based FAO, said in the statement. ``We need the whole film.''
Scientists at the FAO have been trying to shift the focus of disease prevention back to the animals that incubate the virus. H5N1 has killed two of every three people infected this year, leading governments around the world to buy antivirals, including Roche Holding AG's Tamiflu, and to sponsor vaccine development. Focusing on controlling the disease in animal populations would be better, the FAO says.
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