H5N1 Spread on Farms and Backyard Holdings in Egypt
Recombinomics Commentary 12:24
January 2, 2008
more prevalent among birds in poultry farms rather than birds bread domestically. The report, complied by the Public Authority for Veterinary Services, said 25 new outbreaks were detected in Sharkia, Gharbia, Qalyubia, Menoufia, Dakahlia, Cairo, Qena, Beni Suef and Giza.
The report concluded that 90% of the poultry farms fell behind considerably in a number of biological safety benchmarks, which threatens to make it easier for the disease to spread.
The above translation describe some of H5N1 outbreaks reported in recent days in Egypt. The comments confirm earlier reports of H5N1 in backyard holdings and commercial poultry (see satellite map). However, the above comments indicate the infections are more prevalent on the commercial farms, where vaccinations would be expected to be more complete.
Recent H5N1 outbreaks in Europe and Saudi Arabia raised the possibility of increased infections in Egypt, but the vaccination program was implemented to blunt the spread.
The explosion of poultry H5N1 cases provides some rationale for the high number of confirmed and suspect cases, but the cases reported to date are not farm workers, raising the possibility that the H5N1 in Egypt is more efficiently transmitted to humans. Although there have been no confirmed familial clusters this season, there are suspect clusters in Menoufia, Port Said, and Sharquia.
Updated data on the suspect cases and release of sequences fro the confirmed cases, would be useful.
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