# 644
I almost didn't post this item. After all, it seems to be little more than speculation; A Russian official doesn't `rule out' further outbreaks of bird flu in Eastern & Central Russia.
Well, neither do I. But that is hardly news.
In the past, Russian officials have occasionally `telegraphed' the news ahead of any official announcements. Priming the public, so to speak, so that authorities can say some event wasn't `unexpected'.
Perhaps this is just newspaper filler. But I'll be watching Russia for the next few days to see if we start getting reports from there again.
Bird flu outbreak possible in Far East, Central Russia - ministry
09.04.2007, 11.18
MOSCOW, April 9 (Itar-Tass) - The Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations does not rule out bird flu outbreaks in the Far East, in northwestern Russia and in Central Russia.
“It is still possible that bird flu can be brought to the south of the Primorsky Territory and the Sakhalin region from neighbouring territories,” sources from the ministry information department told Tass on Monday.
An outbreak of bird flu is still possible in the Moscow, Tver, Smolensk, Kaluga, Tula, Ryazan and Vladimir regions, they said. According to them, “the spread of the virus to poultry farms and contagion of the risk group – workers of poultry farms, owners of domestic birds and specialists destroying ill poultry, are not ruled out”.
Bird flu cases are also possible in Russia’s North-Western District, where the virus can be brought from territories of other Russian regions.
In February 2007, an outbreak of H5N1 was registered in eight districts of the Moscow region and in households of ten settlements in the Kaluga region.
From 2005 till March 2007, almost 1.4 million domestic birds died of bird flu or had to be destroyed across Russia. The first wave of bird flu was fixed in July-August 2005 in the Volga-Urals and Siberian regions.
In October 2005, the Tula, Tambov, Chelyabinsk, Omsk and Altai regions were hit by the dangerous H5N1 strain of bird flu.
Early in 2006, an outbreak of bird flu was registered in southern Russia.
