SAS Nagar, February 15: “After three weeks of extensive curtailment measures, threat of spread of avian flu in the district has been successfully countered’’, informed Girish Dayalan.
The administration has been on high alert ever since the bird flu confirmation was received on January 21. Twenty five Rapid Response Teams (RRTs) comprising of five members each were deployed for swift action. The culling in the infected farms Alpha, Royal and Evergreen in village Behera commenced on Jan 22 and by Jan 29 nearly 84505 birds from these farms were culled. Subsequently, 2760 eggs and 128850 kg feed was destroyed. This was followed by a period of mopping which lasted for nearly ten days. Thereafter, large scale sanitization measures were initiated, said he and now the concerned farms have been finally issued the certificates of sanitization and the all the aspects of culling operation are complete, added Dayalan.
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Replying to a query regarding the district being free of avian influenza, Dayalan said , “As of now the threat is over but to officially declare the zone to be bird flu free still requires to wait for some time.” For the zone to be bird flu free, it is mandatory that after the culling , mopping and sanitization, the area in 10 km radius of the epicentre has to be monitored closely. It has to be divided into four zones, frequent sampling has to be conducted and fortnightly testing is to be carried out for two months from each zone. If no more positive samples surface, it is only then that the area is declared bird flu free. In the meanwhile, formalin spray after every 15 days has to be done for three months in each of the farms where culling was undertaken; then they can re-commence the business.