Second Bird flu outbreak in India

Health workers slaughtered thousands of chickens in dozens of western Indian villages on Thursday to contain the country's second bird flu outbreak. Four chickens in the Jalgaon district of Maharashtra state tested positive for the H5 strain of bird flu, and authorities are still awaiting the results of tests done to determine if they had the virulent H5N1 variety of the disease. Some 250 workers took part in the culling of about 75,000 chickens. Last month, India suffered its first outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain, and news of the latest outbreak emerged earlier this week. The Maharashtra state chief secretary assured that there was no need to panic and that work was being carried out in a systematic manner. It is yet not clear whether the two outbreaks are related. Jalgaon is about 500 kilometres north of Mumbai and more than 170 kilometres east of Nandurbar, where the first outbreak was centred. Apart from slaughtering birds, workers will also be clearing bird droppings and other waste in Jalgaon over the next two weeks. Bird flu has killed or prompted the culling of more than 140 million chickens and ducks across Asia since 2003, and has recently spread to Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Concerns over the global spread of the disease were heightened again this week when the Caucasus nation of Azerbaijan reported three people killed by the virus. It also has killed 98 other people in Asia, the Middle East and Turkey since 2003, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Although most human infections have been traced to direct contact with sick birds, WHO is worried the virus could mutate into a form that can easily spread among people. However, India has not reported any human cases of bird flu.