THE Department of Agriculture (DA) on Monday said it has completely depopulated 12,000 quails in a farm in Jaen, Nueva Ecija, that has been struck by H5N6 highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI).
This is the country’s first confirmed AI or bird flu outbreak since the 2017 Central Luzon outbreaks, that resulted in the culling of over 200,000 layers and quails.
Furthermore, the DA said farm workers in the lone affected farm in Barangay Ulanin-Pitak, Jaen, Nueva Ecija, would be quarantined within the farm premises for a maximum of 10 days to ensure that they do not contract the H5N6 HPAI.
The H5N6 HPAI strain is known to be transmissible to humans but at a “very slim chance,” according to government’s top veterinarians. Government veterinarians emphasized that the H5N6 HPAI strain that has hit the Philippines is not fatal, “nonfatal” and not known to be transmissible to humans compared to China’s H5N6 strain.
There has been no reported human infections of H5N6 virus in the country ever since the 2017 Central Luzon outbreak.
The H5N6 HPAI strain that hit the lone quail farm in Barangay Ulanin-Pitak is the same strain that struck hundreds of quail and layer farms in Pampanga and Nueva Ecija in 2017. To date, only China has a confirmed human infection with the H5N6 HPAI virus, which according to a World Health Organization (WHO) report dated March 6, has resulted in seven deaths.
China, according to the WHO report, has a total of 24 “laboratory-confirmed” cases of human infection with H5N6.
“It is true that there is a possibility [for] H5N6 to be transmitted to humans. But in our experience, no human beings, not even the farm workers in the infected farms during the 2017 outbreaks were infected by the virus,” Arlene Vytiaco, DA Technical spokesman for AI, said. Vytiaco was also the head of the government’s task force in handling the AI
outbreaks in 2017.
The H5N6 virus could be transmitted to humans through exposure to infected or sick birds, including to their feces and other discharges. Humans do not acquire the virus by eating fully-cooked poultry products.
“There is no evidence that any human cases of avian influenza have been acquired by eating poultry products,” according to the government’s AI Protection Program Manual of Procedures (2016).
The government assured the public that consumption of poultry meat, eggs and quail eggs remains safe as only one quail farm has been affected by bird flu.
United Broiler Raisers Association (Ubra) also gave Filipino consumers assurance that there is no need to stay away from broiler or chicken meat as no broiler farm has been affected by bird flu to date.
Stamped out
Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar said the provincial veterinary office (PVO) of Nueva Ecija received a report of increased mortality of 1,500 heads in a quail farm last March 9, triggering the government’s disease investigation.
The quail farm had a total population of 15,000 heads.
Thirty live samples from quails tested positive for AI on March 13 at the DA’s regional laboratory in Region 3, which was later confirmed by the Bureau of Animal Industry’s national laboratory to be H5N6 HPAI.
Dar said the government has completed the stamping out or culling and burying of the remaining 12,000 quails in the farm last March 14.
“The DA, local government unit officials, are now conducting disease investigation and contact tracing to determine source of infection,” he said in a press briefing.
Unhampered trade
The DA has revised its stamping out protocol following the learning and experience in the 2017 bird flu outbreaks.
The DA will now employ a test and cull protocol wherein it would only depopulate birds within an infected farm and those located in a 1-kilometer radius should they test positive for AI.
Previously, the DA culled all birds located within the 1-kilometer radius of the infected premises.
The DA assured the public it has sufficient funds to purchase additional test kits as it expands it surveillance for bird flu beyond the affected farm.
The DA added it will compensate the quail farm owner with a rate of P10
per depopulated quail, the same amount provided to raisers during the 2017
outbreaks.
“We will always do the best for managing and controlling this. Let’s not panic. We can overcome this with all the solid experiences in the past,” Dar said.
“We are calling upon those engaged in quail poultry and ducks to report immediately if there are deaths among their flocks,” Dar added.
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