USDA opening offices in countries affected by Bird Flu

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is establishing offices and sending personnel to five Asian countries to fight the international spread of the strain of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) known as H5N1, according to a USDA Pandemic Planning Report released June 29.

In addition to the offices in China, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Indonesia -- some shared with offices of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention -- USDA also plans to hire a local national veterinarian dedicated to HPAI activities in Burma, the report said.

The most effective approach to protecting animal and public health from highly pathogenic avian influenza is through active containment of the virus where it currently exists, said U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns in the report.

The strain of bird flu that emerged in Southeast Asia in late 2003 has killed more than 200 million birds through either disease or culling to prevent disease spread. The virus also has killed 130 people, more than half of the total 228 confirmed human infections, most of them after direct contact with sick birds.

Humans have little natural immunity to H5N1 so health officials warn pandemic influenza could break out if the virus develops the capability to pass easily from person to person.

The U.S. government has pledged $334 million to the international campaign against avian influenza and pandemic to be used in a variety of activities in areas of both animal and human health.

USDA is collaborating with the Rome-based U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to establish an Emergency Center for Transboundary Animal Diseases Crisis Management Center to coordinate multinational rapid responses to contain and eradicate HPAI, USDA reports. That involves sending some start-up funds for the Crisis Management Center and providing specialists who can take part in rapid response missions to countries experiencing outbreaks.

The efforts are part of a $21 million "comprehensive program" of international activities USDA is implementing to control the spread of the virus in animals, including sending specialists and resources to countries where they are needed to augment efforts of local governments to combat the disease-causing virus that is causing worldwide concern.

As an example of sharing resources, USDA helped train and deploy an animal health specialist from Senegal to Cameroon earlier in 2006 to augment the capacity of the latter's animal health laboratory during Cameroon's emergency H5N1 eradication efforts.

USDA also is providing workshops to several countries on biosecurity standards and enforcement, undertaking collaborative research on animal diseases and disseminating information about vaccines, according to the report.

In addition, USDA has provided personnel protective equipment and special packing boxes to all of its overseas offices for the safe transport of suspect avian influenza samples to laboratories for testing.

The international efforts are part of USDA's overall strategy to slow the global spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza and expand an avian influenza early warning system in the United States.

USDA, which is leading the U.S. government's animal health efforts to combat highly pathogenic avian influenza, received $91.35 million in emergency funding for the current fiscal year for that mission.

U.S. human health officials are climbing a steep learning curve as they rush to prepare for the possibility of pandemic influenza, according to a separate report issued by Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Mike Leavitt June 29.

"We continue to learn how much we have to learn," said Leavitt in the introduction to an HHS report on the nation's progress in pandemic planning over the last six months.

"While we have accomplished much in a short period of time, the race we are in is not a sprint, but a marathon," said Leavitt.

The disease has spread significantly since March, the report states, as 16 more nations have confirmed the appearance of the H5N1 virus either in wild birds or domestic flocks. Contrary to some expectations, it has not made an appearance in North America.

U.S. international involvement and outreach increased in the first six months of 2006 as government agencies sent U.S. expert teams to the scene of various disease outbreaks. The United States sent specialists to Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Romania, Ukraine, Nigeria and Indonesia in response to the appearance of H5N1.

Top HHS officials have traveled to various international meetings, speaking to officials of other governments to raise awareness about the potential for the outbreak of pandemic influenza and the need for preparedness.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had a scientist on the ground in Sumatra, Indonesia, when authorities investigated a family cluster of H5N1 in which seven people became ill and six died. Though the case did not mark the emergence of the sustained human-to-human transmission that will be the trigger for a pandemic, the joint international health investigation did reveal a mutation of the virus, which allowed passage of the illness from a son to his father.

The CDC specialist involved in the team called the case the first evidence that one person caught the virus from another person, and then passed it on to a third person. CDC’s Dr. Tim Uyeki, part of the Sumatra investigating team, said the virus passed no further than that third person, and reached a dead end.

The last few months have brought what the HHS report describes as encouraging news about the success of containment efforts in Vietnam and Thailand. Both countries conducted extensive poultry culling operations after disease outbreaks in both animals and humans 2005. So far in 2006, neither country has reported further human cases, and the disease appears to be successfully contained among animals.

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