Sweden Announce Slaughtering 200,000 Chickens In Wake Of Bird Flu Virus

Following detection of traces of bird flu virus Sweden will be slaughtering about 200,000 chickens at the Aniagra farm in Morap.

Initially the H5N8 was discovered among ducks at a tiny farm in the Copenhagen region of neighboring country Denmark.

Swedish agriculture department said the mass slaughter of hens in the farm will help them in preventing the expansion of bird flu virus.

On Thursday about 37,000 of the hens were slaughtered and as the farm is big the complete operation will take some time.

Government scientist Karin Ahl said if all of the sites are to be disinfected the operation would take time.

Aniagra farm’s chief Anders Lindberg said the slaughtering of the chickens is a big blow to them but it is more important to stop the virus from spreading further.

Eating eggs will carry no danger from the same far or from any other poultry farms and the Swedish poultry products are safe too, said the agri department citing the virus has never been transmitted from birds to humans.

World Health Organization (WHO) said the H5N8 virus has been detected in poultry as well as wild birds in ten European countries and those are Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Russia, Switzerland, Poland, the Netherlands, Hungary and Croatia.

A week ago the Netherlands too had closed petting zoos as well as banned duck hunting in the country to stem the bird flu outbreak.