By Kenneth Martin

Deadly bird flu strain may have reached Israel
Mar. 16, 2006 18:39 | Updated Mar. 16, 2006 21:01
 

The Health Ministry voiced caution and urged the public not to panic after the Agriculture Ministry announced on Thursday night that turkeys in two Negev farms were "suspected" of having died from the H5N1 strain of avian flu.

Associate director-general Dr. Boaz Lev said that there is no danger to the general public, as avian flu directly among poultry and wild birds and can spread only to people in direct contact with live birds whose droppings contain the virus. There is no danger eating poultry, even if the food supply is affected by the virus, as it is destroyed by the heat of cooking and does not pass to humans who touch raw processed poultry.

"It's a problem for the turkey and the chickens, but not for humans at this point," said Prof. Manfred Green, director of the Israel Center for Disease Control. "If it is bird flu, poultry will be isolated and killed in the affected area within a radius of three kilometers.

"Agriculture workers who have been directly in contact with them could be given anti-virals as a prophylactic measure and on an individual basis," he added. "We are waiting for confirmation. So far, it seems to be the H5 strain, but we are not sure that it is H5N1, which is more infectious."

Israel has had sporadic cases of avian flu in wild birds, but not of the specific strain H5N1.

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