Chief vet rejects demand to vaccinate all outdoor poultry

Jan 15 2008 by Steve Dube, Western Mail

WALES Chief Veterinary Officer Christianne Glossop has rejected calls from one of Britain’s farm research centres for all organic and free-range poultry in the UK to be vaccinated now against the new deadly strain of bird flu.

Dr Glossop said it might be “jumping the gun” to take such action now, when the news from the latest outbreak in Dorset appeared to be so good.

The Organic Research Centre at Elm Farm, Berkshire, said the discovery of avian flu at a swannery in Abbotsbury near Weymouth last week should be the trigger for immediate preventative measures.

But Dr Glossop said, “Vaccination is one of the measures we could take, but we need to be a bit guarded about this.

“It’s still just three dead swans at Abbotsbury and our expert view is that we’re not sure vaccination is a good idea right now but we should keep it under review.”

The trust has been campaigning for preventive vaccination for outdoor poultry for the last two years as the disease crept from the Far East to mainland Europe and into Britain.

Senior policy researcher Richard Sanders said the episode, following the H5N1 outbreak in commercial turkeys near Diss, Norfolk, in November, showed that the virus is circulating in wild birds in the UK.

The ORC is now urging a programme of preventive vaccination across Britain to allow organic, free range and hobby birds to remain outside.

“We consider the wait-and-see approach to be seriously flawed in the case of H5N1 vaccination which takes six weeks to become effective,” said Mr Sanders.

Preventive vaccination has been suggested in the past by government advisers, along with shutting up all poultry inside bird-proof housing.

“Housing all poultry is completely unacceptable, impractical and with some poultry species such as geese, impossible,” said Mr Sanders.

But Dr Glossop said vaccination could mask the symptoms of a much more serious and widespread outbreak, and might not offer full protection anyway.

“We want farmers to tell us if they have a problem, but with vaccination they would not know if their birds were infected,” she said.

There was good news from the swannery at the weekend when two more dead swans tested negative for bird flu.

Another dead swan was found nearby and has been sent for testing. A total of 10 swans have been found dead in the area since December 27, but only three have had the virus – and experts are unsure whether it was the flu that killed them.

“We expect there to continue being birds tested, not least because the public are vigilant at the moment which is great because that means the surveillance is more effective,” said a Defra spokesman.

John Houston, manager at Abbotsbury Tourism, said the number of dead swans was lower than usual for January. “It’s not unusual for birds to die in the winter of natural causes,” he said.

“In fact, there are less dying at the moment than usual because it’s quite warm. Until I hear otherwise I’m going to assume the best.”

Defra has set up control and monitoring areas around the Abbotsbury site to try to contain the outbreak, with severe movement restrictions within the zones.

The control area extends approximately 15 miles (25km) to the south-east of Abbotsbury, and includes the town of Weymouth, Chesil Beach and the Portland Bill headland, while the larger monitoring area of some 20 miles (32km) also covers the town of Dorchester.

The Abbotsbury Swannery is a reserve for free flying swans and wild birds and is part of an internationally important wetland.

It is a seasonal tourist attraction which closed to the public on October 28 last year, and is due to reopen on March 15.

The latest bird flu episode came less than a month after restrictions on poultry movement were lifted in Norfolk and Suffolk after outbreaks there.