Bengal's Bird Flu Threat Still Looms Large

The CPI (M)-ruled West Bengal has not yet fully recovered from the danger posed by bird flu which has seriously affected rural economy on the eve of the panchayat polls.

The state has already been rapped by the Centre as well as UN-affiliated Food and Agriculture Organisation(FAO) for the administration's failure to track the origin of the disease and take necessary precautionary and preventive measures to contain its spread. Union health minister Ambumani Ramdoss also apprehends that the disease may ultimately affect human lives in Bengal first if the culling work is not speeded up.

The Bengal government's somewhat lackadaisical attitude vis-ŕ-vis the bird flu menace is apparent from its decision to form a fact-finding committee almost three months after the outbreak of the disease. The decision was taken at a high-level meeting attended by animal husbandry minister Anisur Rahman and health minister Surya Kanta Mishra yesterday.

The committee will not only oversee the progress of culling operations but also closely monitor the post-culling situation in the affected areas and look into the "genetic sequence" of the disease. The state government feels bid flu, affecting different Bengal districts, has its origin in the neighbouring Bangladesh, but the Centre is yet to confirm its apprehension.

The state government has identified fifteen out of seventeen districts as bird-flu affected. According to an estimate, ten per cent of the total areas in Bengal has been hit by the disease and about 42 lakh chickens have been destroyed in culling operations.