Preliminary tests on bird flu in Macedonia negative, ND suspected
MACEDONIA - Macedonian veterinary authorities said on Wednesday that there is no bird flu in the country as preliminary results of the tests carried out in the Weybridge reference laboratory in UK proved negative.According to the Director of the Macedonian Veterinary Administration Slobodan Cokrevski some thousands suspected birds found dead two weeks ago in the village of Mogila- near the southwestern town of Bitola (Manastir) - have died of Newcastle disease and not from Avian Influenza as suspected.
Following the initial suspected case of infection in October, thousands of poultry have been killed amid fears of infection.
Authorities promised to compensate farmers for the destroyed domestic poultry as soon as possible. Cokrevski said the government will allocate for the owners some 40’000 EUROs.
However, the government said it has step up preventive measures regardless of the preliminary results of tests coming from UK laboratory.
Source: dtt-net.com
2 November 2005
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