PARIS (Reuters) - The bird flu virus that has killed hundreds of people since 2003 has now stabilized but risks that it mutates into a new dangerous form cannot be ruled out, the head of the World Animal Health body OIE said on Thursday.
By Sybille de La Hamaide
PARIS (Reuters) - The bird flu virus that has killed hundreds of people since 2003 has now stabilized but risks that it mutates into a new dangerous form cannot be ruled out, the head of the World Animal Health body OIE said on Thursday.
Since the outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza re-emerged in Asia in 2003, 216 people have died of the virus which quickly spread around the globe, including Asia, Africa and Europe, through poultry flocks and wild birds.
"We notice that the virus is now extremely stable but there is no base to say that the H5N1 will not mutate," OIE President Bernard Vallat told reporters.
!ADVERTISEMENT!"Bird flu will always remain a risk, be it H5N1 or another."
Bird flu cases are still regularly reported to the OIE -- Britain said on Thursday that the flu strain had been confirmed in three wild mute swans found dead in Dorset, southern England.
Vallat said Indonesia, Egypt and at a lesser extend Nigeria, where the disease is endemic, remained the main worry for the OIE because they could serve as reservoirs for the virus.
OTHER DISEASES
Vallat said other diseases were also catching the OIE's close attention like the West Nile virus which likely entered the United States though a parrot and then spread by mosquitoes to the rest of the country, killing hundreds of people.
He also mentioned the Rift Valley fever which is spreading in Africa, has a high death rate, and could adapt to southern Mediterranean countries.
"Diseases can now spread faster across the world than before," Vallat said, calling for stronger surveillance, larger government budget to ensure countries have early detection systems and encourage rapid notification.
Vallat regretted how the bird flu crisis was sit out over the last years.
"The bird flu virus was badly handled. We lost two years. We could have stopped it in Vietnam," he said, although stressing that the panic that followed the outbreak had caught a wider number of governments' attention on the risks of a pandemic.
"Now we are far better prepared than we were," he added. "It will certainly be useful, I'm afraid."
