Border Area adjacent to Surin Province on high alert for Bird Flu

Kimhan Yongrattanakit (คิมหันต์ ยงรัตนกิจ), the Surin Public Health Official, revealed that the provincial public health office had instructed relevant units to closely monitor the bird flu situation in the border area adjacent to the province. The authorities have strictly prohibited the import of poultry from the neighboring countries, including Cambodia, Lao, and Vietnam.

Mr Kimhan encourages local residents to inform public health officials if they suspect the mysterious deaths of fowls. The residents were strictly instructed not to have direct physical contact with the dead fowls. Mr Kimhan also suggested that hosiptals should carefully go through the medical history of patients; and if patients have records of poultry contact, doctors should classify these patients under the bird flu symptom sector.

The provincial public health office has also set up mobile units to control the spread of the pandemic. However, there has been no report of the spread of bird flu in the province as yet.

The department of livestocks development has earlier announced that some open-range ducks in Phitsanulok (พิษณุโลก) Province had died of bird flu. Currently, there have been no reports of humans who have contracted the H5N1 strain of bird flu.

Source: Thai National News Bureau Public Relations Department - 19 January 2007

surin province is far from phitsanoluk - so why this allarming 'revelation' ?