Statement on Avian Influenza
It is important to underline that the H5N1 strain of avian influenza, now reported in southern Europe, is essentially a disease of birds and poultry. The risk to human health only arises in persons in very close contact with infected birds.
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The NFU, together with the British poultry industry and the government are working very closely together to minimise the risk of the disease entering this country. The NFU and poultry representative bodies urge the Government to step up its controls at border points. In the event that the H5N1 virus does enter the country we are taking every step to ensure that any outbreak in poultry would be quickly recognised, contained and eradicated.
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The NFU and other poultry bodies have been working closely with Defra for the last 31/2 years to develop contingency plans. Each of our organisations has a register of all its poultry members and has communicated on issues of disease control on a regular basis. However, we all agree that we should coordinate our database, on the location and size of all our commercial enterprises, so that we can issue precautionary messages quickly to all poultry farmers and be fully prepared to manage a disease outbreak.
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The European Directive on Avian Influenza will require us to introduce a poultry register by 2007 - but we must move much faster than that. We have therefore agreed that Defra will immediately start work on compiling its existing data sources so that it can begin inviting new registrations from poultry businesses within the next month.
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The British poultry industry is highly professional and responsible, works under very close veterinary scrutiny and has had strict biosecurity arrangements in place for many years.
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In the event of an outbreak, we would all have particular concerns over the health of poultry farmers, their families and their staff. This concerns around 50,000 people. However, poultry businesses and their employees need clear guidance on how to assure worker safety in the event of Avian flu. Already a wide range of industry stakeholders have been working on this issue with the Health Protection Agency, Health and Safety Executive, State Veterinary Service, Department of Health and others. We are all committed to ensuring that the guidance is available this month and the NFU and other poultry associations will use their membership lists to distribute it throughout the industry.
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We know that small semi-commercial and hobby poultry keepers need effective non-technical advice on how to protect their birds. Defra are launching a simple one page guide of key points which they have prepared for this purpose. Defra and the industry will do all it can to ensure that the guide is made widely available to this important sector.
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The British poultry industry is a real success story, with an annual value at farm level of £1,674 million. We have the second biggest poultry industry in Europe (after France), producing almost 14% of Europe's poultrymeat to the highest quality with very strict production standards. Poultry and poultry products remain a delicious and nutritious part of the British diet, especially when backed by food assurance schemes such as the Red tractor. Virtually all the fresh poultrymeat you buy in Britain is of British origin. It would be a tragedy if this industry were to be undermined by Avian Influenza, or by unfounded scare stories.
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We would again like to underline the fact that the World Health Organisation and the British Food Standards Agency have both confirmed that properly cooked poultry products present absolutely no risk to human health.
Further information
See the avian influenza pages in our animal health section.
Page published: 20 October 2005