14 August 2008
Lagos — Ghana's Veterinary Services Directorate, alarmed at the resurgence of avian influenza (bird flu) in Nigeria, is seeking a meeting with its eastern neighbours, Togo and Benin Republic to discuss common measures to prevent it from spreading to their countries.
Dr Enoch Koney, Acting Director, said a similar cross border meeting had been planned with Cote d'Ivoire to the west and Burkina Faso to the north.
Nigeria is sited to the east of Ghana. Ghana declared itself free from the disease about two years ago after culling and other measures.
Speaking on Tuesday in Kumasi at a day's simulation exercise on avian influenza, he said all regional directors of agriculture as well as veterinary officers had been informed about the new case in Nigeria.
Koney said this was to strengthen surveillance in all avian influenza risk-prone areas and asked them not to be complacent in their prevention and control measures.
He urged them to have a constant check at all live bird markets and monitor the staging posts of migratory wild birds at wetlands while they strictly enforced import permits for poultry and poultry products.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has warned that a new strain of avian influenza never before reported in Africa has been identified in Nigeria.
It said tests conducted by Nigeria and by the FAO showed that the new virus strain which was similar to strains identified last year in Italy, Afghanistan and Iran was genetically distinct from other forms detected in Nigeria in 2006 and 2007.
It pointed to other avenues the virus could have taken to Nigeria, such as international trade or illegal and unreported movement of poultry. "This increases the risk of an avian influenza spread to other countries in Western Africa,"
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