Avian flu virus detected in swans in W. Europe
ROME -- Bird flu has reached Western Europe, with Italy and Greece announcing yesterday they had detected the H5N1 strain of the virus in dead swans.
The announcement that the disease was detected in five swans in southern Italy came a day after the opening of the Winter Games in Turin, several hundred miles to the north. Italian officials said the virus had only affected wild birds and posed no immediate risk to people.
The European Union said the deadly strain, which has infected at least 166 people and killed 88, most in Asia, also had been confirmed in swans in Bulgaria.
No human infections were reported in the three countries, but the outbreak raised concerns that the spread of the disease could increase chances for it to mutate into a form easily transmissible among humans.
''It's a relatively safe situation for human health; less so for animal health," Italian Health Minister Francesco Storace said.
Also yesterday, authorities in Nigeria were investigating whether the deadly strain, discovered in the country recently, had spread to humans after at least two children were reported ill.
''We have got bird flu now in southeast Asia, central Asia, eastern Europe, and west Africa," Dr. David Nabarro said, before the Greek and Italian announcements. ''Compared with eight months ago, this is a major extension of the avian influenza epidemic."
Experts said they were reassured by the fact that the virus has been detected in wild birds instead of on farms.
''The risk to humans is less if the disease is in wildlife than if it is in poultry," said Juan Lubroth, a senior animal health officer at the Rome-based UN Food and Agriculture Organization.
The virus was found in five swans in the southern Italian regions of Puglia, Calabria and Sicily, Storace said. The birds arrived from the Balkans, he said, likely pushed south by cold weather.
Greek authorities said health experts were checking poultry on farms and homes in the region where infected swans were found outside Thessaloniki.
