Bird flu outbreak controversy rages on

Channel 4 News reported yesterday that Hungarian vets were carrying out tests on the processed meat, said to have been taken from the Suffolk farm at the centre of the outbreak to Hungary in the past few days.

Vets would get the results of those tests today, the programme said.

Yesterday the Sunday Times claimed lorryloads of turkey meat had been taken from Bernard Matthews' farm in Holton, Suffolk, to Hungary as late as three days after bird flu was confirmed at the farm on February 1.

Also yesterday, Environment Secretary David Miliband laid the blame for the bird flu outbreak at the farm squarely at the door of the British firm.

It followed the Government's announcement on Thursday that scientists would be examining a food processing plant on the Holton farm - and that the virus had spread to three more of the farm's 21 sheds.

An exclusion zone has been in place around the farm since the H5N1 strain took hold there.

Bernard Matthews said on Thursday that it had suspended all further trade between Hungary and the UK.

Source: 24dash.com