Bird Flu in Britian

www.worldpoultry.net has been reporting on the avian flu outbreak in Suffolk, England. Apparently, 2,600 turkeys died from H5N1 within a few days. As a result the remaining 159,000 are all being gassed to death to prevent the spread of the disease. At first the disease was blamed on the possibility of infection via contact with a wild bird.



Now there is an investigation to see if this is linked to a recent outbreak in Hungary which resulted in thousand of geese being destroyed. According to the Guardian Unlimited web site (http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/story/0,,2006082,00.html) the Bernard Matthews turkey farm in Suffolk is owned by the same company that owns Saga Foods, Hungary’s largest poultry company.



A follow up report by worldpoultry.net shows that this has not effected poultry purchases by British consumers.



OK. Some comments:

 A place with over 161,000 turkeys is not a farm. It’s a factory.

 This factory environment with it’s overcrowding of animals, lack of fresh air, sunshine, and cleanliness is the perfect breeding ground for disease.

 Animals existing (I can’t call it “living”) in these factory farms are under stress and have weakened immune systems already.

 It is no surprise that the feared disease would show up here. I am pretty sure that a wild bird had nothing to do with bringing in the disease. I think it’s a matter of hygiene, proportion, and humane treatment of animals.

 This type of “farming” is a time bomb waiting for an excuse to go off.

 Small sustainable farms are the only viable way to raise safe, nutritious food.

It won’t be the small farm or backyard flock that brings about a pandemic. It will be ridiculously huge unmanageable factory farms.