AVA monitoring Tyson chicken products

15,000 chickens culled after being exposed to mild strain of H7N3 virus in Arkansas

Tan Hui Leng, Today Online 5 Jun 08;

THE Singapore Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) is keeping an eye on the situation following reports, out of the United States, that Tyson Foods has begun culling 15,000 chickens that had been exposed to a mild strain of avian flu in Arkansas.

An AVA spokesperson said Singapore imported 289 tonnes of Tyson chicken products this year.

“We are monitoring the situation and are in close contact with our counterparts,” he said. “Only chicken that are safe to eat and free from bird flu are allowed to be imported into Singapore.”

News broke on Tuesday that the US meat company would cull the chickens in north-west Arkansas that had been exposed to a mild strain of bird flu, the H7N3. The company also said it will test other flocks in the area for bird flu. Affected chickens will not enter the food supply.

Director of the state’s Livestock and Poultry Commission, Mr Jon Fitch, told the Associated Press the birds tested positive for exposure to the H7N3 strain — not the H5N1 strain that ravaged Asian poultry stocks in late 2003 and has killed 241 people worldwide.

“There is absolutely no human health threat,” he said. “The speculation at this point in time was that a large group of Canadian geese made home on a pond very near this facility.”

Meanwhile, in central England, an outbreak of the H7 strain of bird flu at a farm has been described by officials as “highly pathogenic” :— meaning the virus has a relatively high ability to produce disease.

All the chickens on the farm have been slaughtered following detection of the virus, which does not pose a high risk to humans, AFP reported. Nevertheless, Japan announced it was suspending imports of poultry from Britain. Singapore has already suspended import of poultry from the UK.