Bird Flu In Laos!

[Mai Krap]

There are reports coming out of Laos that poultry sales are being banned in and around Vientiane. They have began mass cullings of poultry most of which are waterfowl "Ducks and Geese". In the last week there have been two deaths but it is unclear what the true numbers of death may be since their is no accounting for such things in Laos. What has not been widely publisized is that at least one of these deaths occured in Thailand in Nong Kai as the unfortunate child who became ill was brought to the hospital there. This is posing a very large problem to Thailand as it trys to improve its bird facilities yet a short flight away there is still a remaining culture of open bird farming. As people become sick they are being brought to Thailand for treatment and the scariest aspect of all is the sell of chicken meat. It is well known that in recent years when pork meat was considered contaminted and banned from sales in Thailand it was dumped on the market in Laos. We could have a repeat of this as chicken sales are banned in Laos those who do not see the danger of the current crises will try and place their poultry onto the market in Thailand.

HEALTH-LAOS:

On the Bird Flu Map

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Mar 11 (IPS) - A spell of good fortune that South-east Asia's poorest country enjoyed for three years ran out this month. Laos has become the 11th country in the world to record a human death from the bird flu virus.

The reaction from Vientiane, soon after the death of a 15-year-old girl from a suburb of the Laotian capital, suggests that this fatality may not be the last, since the deadly H5N1 strain of the virus is reported in four areas, and spreading.

''The government is enforcing immediate and stringent interventions such as culling of all infected poultry, strengthening hospital surveillance and carrying out intensive information campaigns to educate people,'' Health Minister Dr. Ponmek Dalaloy said Thursday.

To achieve that, the government in the one-party communist state announced a list of preventive measures. It urged the public to wash hands regularly with soap, eat properly cooked chicken meat and avoid ‘'any contact with sick or dead poultry'' and report ‘'any sick or dead poultry to local authorities.''

‘'The virus is really unpredictable. The government is doing all it can to ensure the country's health system is prepared,'' Dida Connor, spokeswoman for the World Health Organisation (WHO)'s Laos and Vietnam office, told IPS from Vientiane. ‘'The existing public awareness campaigns have to be intensified.''

The teenage victim who had been hospitalised in the Thai town of Nong Khai, located on the Thai-Laos border and across Vientiane, was living in a suburb of the Laotian capital where the deadly virus had infected the poultry population in January. She died on Mar. 7 after being hospitalised for 19 days.

Tests are continuing to confirm if the death of a 42-year-old Laotian woman last week was also linked to avian influenza. But while they wait for answers, public health authorities in Thai provinces that border Laos have sounded the alarm for greater vigilance, since the border is porous and is separated in some parts by the waters of the Mekong river.

‘'Preventive measures along the Thai-Lao border need strengthening,'' Dr. Itthipol Sungkhaeng, Nong Khai's public health chief, told the state-run Thai News Agency this week. ‘'All hospitals and health centres along the border have been instructed to closely watch their patients.''

He called for extra precautions, since the prevailing dry season in this region results in the Mekong's water level becoming ‘'shallower and hence more convenient for informal boat crossings.''

The other regions in land-locked Laos where the H5N1 strain of the virus have been reported include Suwanna Khet and Champasak, both towns located close to the Thai and Cambodian border. Laos is surrounded by China to the north, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the south and Thailand to the west.

To date, 168 people have died due to bird flu and 275 have been infected by the virus. Till this month's death, Laos had remained a mystery in a region that was combating a virus spreading far and wide and leading to mounting human fatalities. Vietnam has recorded 42 deaths, Thailand 17 deaths and Cambodia has seen six deaths from bird flu. South-east Asian giant Indonesia has been the worst hit with 63 human fatalities from avian influenza virus out of 81 reported cases.

Over 50 countries across Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Europe have had poultry populations affected by the virus since the current outbreak began in the winter of 2003.

Concerns about poverty-stricken countries like Laos having difficulty to cope with the challenges posed by this deadly virus have dogged international public and animal health experts since South-east Asia emerged as the epicentre of the H5N1 strain. After all, the WHO had warned that the virus could mutate into a flu that is easily passed between humans, triggering a pandemic that could kill millions.

These uncertainties were addressed at a major international donor conference in Beijing in January last year, where countries led by the United States pledged 1.9 billion US dollars to combat the spread of bird flu across the globe. The amounts promised by Washington, 330 million dollars, and the European Union, over 250 million dollars, bettered the expectations of the World Bank, which had asked donors for 1.5 billion dollars to wage a global campaign to defeat the virus.

Laos was guaranteed 5.5 million dollars of that purse for one- and three-year projects, of which 1.5 million dollars have been spent. ‘'The funds were needed because animal health services had not enjoyed the support they required,'' says Robyn Alders, technical advisor at the Food and Agriculture Organisation's (FAO) Asia-Pacific regional office. ‘'The country lacked trained veterinary staff.''

The injection of international aid has helped to train local veterinarians to build urgently needed surveillance systems and laboratories to track the virus, she added in an interview. ‘'The government has responded quickly to these new challenges.''

The long run of luck that Laos had enjoyed stemmed from the communities in a country with a 5.4 million population being spread out over a vast rural area and having limited contact, according to the food agency. It had one bird flu outbreak in March 2004 and a second one in July 2006.

The outbreak that began in January confirms a pattern in Laos in which sick poultry are detected in places with large concentrations of people.

‘'The recent outbreaks have spread along roads and in urban areas, where you have a high concentration of people and poultry,'' says Alders. ‘'Both free-range chickens and poultry at commercial sites have been affected.'' (END/2007)