AVIAN FLU NEWS

North America gears up for avian flu
Scientists say migrating birds may bring virus to U.S. mainland by fall

BY SEAN MUSSENDEN AND A.J. HOSTETLER
MEDIA GENERAL NEWS SERVICE / TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Apr 2, 2006

The bird-flu virus could kill thousands of birds and devastate the $29 billion U.S. poultry industry. They're sifting through goose poop in the wilds of Alaska.

They're sending out undercover birds as spies.

They're tracking waterfowl with satellites, drawing chicken blood on Virginia farms and swabbing poultry beaks in Alabama.

Across the country, scientists and public-health officials are on a high-stakes hunt for a deadly Asian strain of bird flu.

It's a serious mission with an uncertain outcome. The virus might never show up, or it could kill thousands of birds and devastate the $29 billion U.S. poultry industry.

Or, in a nightmare scenario, it could combine with a strain of human flu, creating a pandemic super-virus that spreads easily from person to person and kills millions.

To prepare for that possibility, the U.S. government is spending billions to stockpile vaccines and anti-viral drugs and millions more to monitor the spread of the virus.

"We may be the first generation in human history with the ability to do something in advance of this," Health and Human Services Secretary Michael O. Leavitt said.

The bird-flu strain, known as highly pathogenic H5N1, has spread across Asia, Europe and Africa, killing thousands of wild birds and poultry. In rare cases, the bird virus has jumped to humans, killing about half it infects -- 108 people worldwide since 2003.

Scientists believe the disease will reach North America soon. Identifying it quickly will be crucial to containing it.

Government agencies are focusing on wild birds that cross continents as they migrate thousands of miles. Alaska is ground zero: In the spring and summer, the vast northern wilderness provides an ideal nesting ground for millions of wild birds from Asia and North America.

"Alaska is kind of the crossroads, the Grand Central Station for migratory birds," said Paul Slota, an avian-flu specialist with the U.S. Geological Survey's National Wildlife Health Center.

Scientists worry that birds migrating through Asia will carry the virus to Alaska this month and intermingle with North American-based species. When the North American birds move south, they could bring the virus into the U.S. mainland by the fall.

. . .

Last month, officials from Slota's agency and the U.S. Department of Agriculture rolled out a vastly expanded monitoring plan for wild birds, primarily waterfowl.

Last year, government scientists tested an estimated 2,000 samples from wild birds, USDA said. This year, they will test closer to 150,000.

They will take fecal samples from live birds, test birds killed by hunters or those found dead in the wild, sample water where wild birds congregate and test spy birds -- known as "sentinel ducks" -- sent to mix with wild birds.

If the disease is found, scientists would alert public-health officials and the poultry industry along the migration route, but the wild flock likely would not be destroyed.

If the virus shows up in a U.S. poultry flock or a human, it would pose a much greater risk to public health. Worldwide, there have been no confirmed cases of a human contracting avian flu from interacting with wild birds.

Waterfowl and shorebirds, the primary reservoirs of viruses such as H5N1, can carry the disease without dying. When the virus spreads to land-based birds -- especially chickens -- through feces, infected water or respiratory secretions, it frequently becomes much more lethal, said Bill Pierson, an avian infectious-disease specialist at the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine at Virginia Tech.

Scientists worry that the avian flu will infect a person already sick with the seasonal human flu. If this Superman bird virus combines forces with a Wonder Woman strain of human flu, the alliance could produce what Pierson calls a "monster virus" able to spread rapidly among a susceptible human population, producing a pandemic.

That's one reason poultry farmers in the Southeast, the epicenter of the American poultry industry, take biosecurity seriously. In a stark contrast to Asia -- where chickens roam freely in villages, facilitating the spread of the virus to humans -- most poultry here is produced in controlled environments.

. . .

At his family farm near Harrisonburg, James Rodes raises chickens, 16,000 at a time, for Perdue in an enclosed chicken house designed to keep his birds in and wild birds out.

The handful of people authorized to enter his chicken house must wear protective suits, as well as boot and head coverings at all times.

"With the thousands of dollars I've got borrowed to run this farm, I can't help but take the threat of avian flu very seriously," Rodes said. "But with the biosecurity measures we've got in place, I feel pretty comfortable."

When the birds are 22 weeks old, they are moved to another farm to lay eggs. Before the move, a Perdue technician will take blood samples from several chickens to check for avian flu and other diseases.

In some states, such as Alabama, government agriculture inspectors regularly take samples from commercial poultry flocks.

On a recent morning on a poultry farm near Clanton, Ala., state agriculture department official Ray Hilburn held a feisty rooster while an assistant swabbed the inside of its throat.

"We used to, on average, test between 10,000 and 20,000 samples per year. Now our testing this year will be above 200,000," Hilburn said.

If H5N1 or other highly pathogenic strains of avian flu are found in domestic poultry, government regulations require the flock's immediate destruction.

In Texas last year, fast work by state and federal officials prevented a major outbreak of a similar bird-flu virus. The owner of an infected flock regularly sent dead birds to a state lab for testing. One day, a test turned up high-path avian flu. The flock was quickly destroyed. Flocks at two live-bird markets where the virus had moved were killed, and it spread no further.

"The big thing with avian influenza is how quickly you respond to it. The response to the Texas case worked," said Fidelis Hegngi, a senior staff veterinarian specializing in poultry with National Center for Animal Health Programs, a branch of the USDA.

. . .

As the global threat of avian flu increases, the USDA is working with states to increase surveillance of high-risk populations -- so called "backyard" flocks that are not raised in sheltered houses.

The H5N1 virus was first detected in 1997 in the bird markets and homes of Hong Kong. Six people and millions of chickens died before the outbreak was extinguished. The current outbreak, which began in 2003 in Asia and has accelerated this year through the Middle East, Europe and Africa, has killed 108 people, according to the World Health Organization.

With the virus moving into more countries each week, there is a growing consensus among scientists that the disease will reach the United States, most likely this year as birds return from their summer migrations.

Thomas Toth, an avian virologist at the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine, said he is 100 percent certain that the virus will reach North America. For him, there's just one question.

"It is not whether," Toth said, "rather it is when."
Contact Sean Mussenden at smussenden@mediageneral.com or (202) 662-7668.

Contact A.J. Hostetler at ahostetler@timesdispatch.com or (804) 649-6355.
Phillip Ohnemus of WIAT-TV in Birmingham, Ala., contributed to this report.