Vietnam breeders regain after bird flu scourge

VIETNAM - Chicken breeders such as Huynh Thi Ba are just starting to break even more than two years into the Avian Flu epidemic that shattered the livelihood of some Vietnamese poultry farmers.

Thousands of chickens clucking away in wire cages of a large coop behind her village home in central Vietnam avoided the deadly H5N1 virus and are now protected by costly measures such as disinfectant, vaccinations and feed to boost immunity.

“I ate and I slept with the chickens so I could make certain that none of my chickens had problems,” Ba said at her family-run poultry farm in Khai Tay, 15 km from the coastal city of Danang.

The farm was presented yesterday as a model of disease prevention to officials at the May 4-6 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) avian flu conference in Danang.

The Communist-run Vietnam has been praised by the international health officials for fighting the disease, which has killed 114 people worldwide in just over two years.

Source: The Navhind Times

8 May 2006