H5N1 bird flu in England is Asian strain: government
Posted: 04 February 2007 0241 hrs

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LONDON - The H5N1 strain of the bird flu virus found on a turkey farm in eastern England is the highly pathogenic Asian strain similar to that found in Hungary last month, the government said Saturday.

"Tests from the Veterinary Laboratories Agency have confirmed that the sample from the poultry found dead on a farm near Lowestoft in Suffolk contained the H5N1 avian flu virus, and that it is the highly pathogenic Asian strain," the environment ministry said.

"It is similar to the virus that was found in Hungary in January."

Britain's first outbreak of potentially lethal H5N1 bird flu was detected at the Bernard Matthews turkey farm in Holton, Suffolk, in eastern England.

More than 160 people have been killed around the world by H5N1 since 2003, most of them in Asia.

The government's top-level COBRA emergency response committee met twice on Saturday to discuss the response to the situation, a Downing Street spokesman told AFP.

The Hungarian outbreak last month, detected among geese, was the first within the European Union since mid-2006.

- AFP /ls