Asia-Pacific

Myanmar declares itself free of bird flu

(AP)
Updated: 2006-09-06 15:00

YANGON, Myanmar - Myanmar has declared itself free of bird flu after a three-month detection program found no new cases in the impoverished Southeast Asian country, state-run media reported Wednesday.

Livestock officials teamed up with foreig

n experts to determine if the disease had spread after Myanmar's first outbreak of the deadly H5N1 virus was detected earlier this year, the New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported.

During a three-month program that started in late April, the experts found no other bird flu cases, prompting the livestock ministry on Monday to "declare Myanmar as a nation free from bird flu," the newspaper said.

Myanmar discovered the country's first outbreak of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu in chickens and quails in the Mandalay and Sagaing regions in central Myanmar in early March.

Authorities banned transport of poultry and barred the sale of chicken and eggs at markets in affected regions and slaughtered 342,000 chickens and 320,000 quails at 545 farms and destroyed 180,000 chicken and quail eggs to prevent the spread of the disease.

Restrictions were lifted on May 1 after the outbreak was brought under control.

Myanmar has reported no human infections of the H5N1 virus, which has killed at least 141 people worldwide since it began ravaging Asian poultry stocks in late 2003.