(AP) Virginia agriculture officials are asking for help to prevent a deadly bird disease from spreading into the state.
The illness, called Exotic Newcastle Disease, has hit poultry flocks in California, where it has cost growers millions of dollars and led to quarantines that have shut down much of the state's poultry industry. In January, the first case outside California was discovered in a backyard chicken flock in Nevada.
Officials with the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services are asking everyone involved with birds in Virginia "to observe basic principles of biosecurity" to prevent the disease from entering the state.
Such principles, the department said, include sanitation measures such as disinfecting footwear and surveillance measures such as barring birds from exhibitions if they have been involved in similar events in areas where the disease has been detected.
Exotic Newcastle Disease is highly contagious and usually deadly to infected birds.
"All species of birds are susceptible," said J. Carlton Courter III, Virginia's agriculture commissioner, "so this is a threat to pet-bird breeders, pet owners, our entire poultry industry and possibly even wild birds."
An outbreak of avian influenza last year led to the destruction of nearly 5 million chickens and turkeys on nearly 200 Virginia poultry farms, at a cost to poultry growers estimated at about $130 million.
Agriculture experts consider avian flu a much less threatening illness than Exotic Newcastle Disease, which, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, "is probably one of the most infectious diseases of poultry in the world."
Symptoms of the disease include respiratory problems such as coughing and sneezing, and neurological problems including circling and paralysis.
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Avian flu fight proposed
Live-bird markets would be targeted
Feb 09, 2003
The Virginia poultry industry wants to better control the spread of avian flu by plugging bio-defenses at the state borders against one of the biggest hazards in the business.
A bill before the General Assembly would give the state veterinarian the authority to test poultry bound for Virginia for avian flu.
Despite fastidious bio-security against the virus, an epidemic last year and attempts to contain it cost poultry agribusiness as much as $130 million and many farmers their livelihoods for much of 2002.
Although the source of the contamination was never determined, growers and agriculture officials cast suspicion beyond state borders, particularly at live-bird markets in northeastern cities.
Hobey Bauhan, president of the Virginia Poultry Federation, said bio-security at the markets is not always as tight as that practiced by the state poultry industry.
"I think it's an important point of focus for government to reduce the risk of . . . avian influenza to commercial poultry and agribusiness," Bauhan said.
State Sen. Emmett W. Hanger Jr., R-Augusta, sponsored the bill in the Senate. Del. Glenn M. Weatherholtz, R-Rockingham, sponsored the version in the House of Delegates. Each version passed in its original chamber.
The urban bird markets receive live poultry from farms all over the eastern United States.
The markets tend to be reservoirs for the mild, mostly nonfatal strain of avian flu like the one that plagued Virginia poultry last year. The same strain that struck Virginia had been detected in the urban markets, Bauhan said.
The Virginia Poultry Federation advises commercial farm workers to stay away from the markets.
The virus causes an upper-respiratory infection in birds but does not affect humans. Last year's strain contaminated 197 farms and led to the destruction of 4.7 million birds.
The disease would probably not have arrived with a live bird from a city market to the valley, since poultry from farms here would supply the markets.
Avian is highly contagious, however. It could have been tracked in on people or equipment coming back to Virginia from one of the markets, Bauhan said.
"We're just concerned about the traffic to and from these markets and the level of bio-security at them," he said. The Poultry Federation and the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Service helped write the proposal.
The bill would authorize the state veterinarian to require that chickens, turkeys, waterfowl and game birds be tested for avian flu before they get to Virginia. The state veterinarian could use the authority at his discretion whenever the disease threatens.
The measure would add to strict bio-security protocols already in place. State agriculture officials regularly test all flocks for avian flu. When a case is confirmed, the contaminated farm is quarantined and farm workers throughout the area adopt strict disinfection routines on themselves, their vehicles and equipment.
Even if the measure passes, with Virginia's heavy poultry traffic, no defense is impenetrable to a bug as opportunistic as avian flu, said Dr. David Cardin, program manager for state Office of Veterinary Services.
"Like with any other disease, you might not be able to be 100 percent sure [about avian], because you wouldn't know of all cases of importation," Cardin said.
(Contact Calvin R. Trice at (540) 574-9977 or ctrice@timesdispatch.com)
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