Bird flu hits urban areas

18 Dec 2008, 0009 hrs IST, Kounteya Sinha, TNN

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NEW DELHI: With the deadly bird flu hitting urban areas of the country, for the first time a visibly worried Union health ministry has stepped up
surveillance on human beings in the affected districts.

Officials told TOI that about 17 lakh people in Assam alone have already been checked for symptoms of Avian Influenza. The ministry plans to check 95% of the population living within a 0-3 km radius of the outbreak. At least 1,149 health workers were deployed for the surveillance.

Around 30% of the population in the 3-10 km radius is also being checked for symptoms like cough and cold, history of poultry handling and lower respiratory infection. At least 143 cases of Upper Respiratory Infection (URI) with fever have already been detected (78 in 0-3 km radius and 65 in 3-10 km radius). None of them, however, had any history of handling dead or sick birds.

Seven districts in Assam -- Kamrup Rural and Metro, Nalbari, Barpeta, Darrang, Dibrugarh and Bongaigaon -- have been affected by the virus.

On Thursday, blood samples of crows found dead in the Chatribari area in Guwahati were confirmed as H5N1 positive by laboratories in Bhopal and Pune.

Over four lakh birds have been culled and Rs 1.11 crore paid as compensation to the affected poultry farmers. The Union health ministry has already rushed 30,000 tablets of Tamiflu to Assam.

Meanwhile, animal husbandry department notified a bird flu outbreak in Englishbazar block of Malda in West Bengal on December 15. Active surveillance in a 0-3 km has started and the state government has been provided with ventilators, personal protective equipments and Tamilfu. An additional 5,000 capsules of Tamiflu have been kept on hold for West Bengal and will be sent soon.

Sources said 86 animal health workers who are under Tamilfu are conducting culling activities.

A health ministry official said: "We have never had a re-infection in India. The return of the virus in Malda has raised serious concern that the virus may have got embedded in the state. Scientists are trying to find whether West Bengal has become a reservoir or not."

The official added: "What's worse is that the outbreaks this time have occurred in urban settings which are also more risky, considering the population."

In Assam, health minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had earlier expressed his serious fears about strains of the deadly bird flu virus spreading to humans. "We are really worried about the bird flu virus spreading to humans as the strains transmit rapidly," he said.