Mass cull of turkeys after bird flu outbreak in run-up to Christmas

All the birds at a British turkey farm will
have to be killed after an outbreak of bird
flu.


In just over a week, families around the
country will be sitting down to Christmas
dinner with the bird the main piece for
most.
Turkey farmers will
have been working
towards this period
all year, but there are
now fears the virus
could spread –
although the
government says
problems with festive
stock levels are not ‘anticipated’.
The agriculture department has revealed
that the H5N8 bird flu strain has been
found at a turkey farm with more than
5,000 birds in Lincolnshire, eastern
England.
It’s the first time in over a year that there
has been a case of bird flu in Britain – the
last was in July 2015.
Most birds at the farm have died, officials
said, and the remaining birds will be put
down.

A 3km protection zone has been put in
place around the farm in Louth.
Several other countries including France
and Israel have reported cases of H5N8
bird flu in the last few weeks, and some
governments have ordered all poultry to be
kept indoors to stop the disease spreading
to other farms.
Last week, France widened ‘high risk’
restrictions to the entire country after
several cases of bird flu in southwest
France and in wild ducks in northern
France.
The last case of bird
flu in Britain was in
July 2015 when the
H7N7 strain was
detected near
Preston, northern
England. Earlier that
year the same strain
was confirmed at a
farm in Hampshire,
southern England.
‘The advice from (health authorities) is
that the risk to public health from the virus
is very low,’ the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said
in a statement.
‘There is not anticipated to be any impact
on the supplies of turkeys or other birds
over Christmas.’