# 4690
Just a few years ago, for many villagers in places like Indonesia, Vietnam, and Cambodia, it would have been unthinkable to believe that their chickens could make them sick.
Families had raised these birds for generations without ill effect, and so convincing them that H5N1 is a threat isn’t easy.
In 2007 the NGO CARE conducted a poll in Cambodia to gauge perceptions among villagers about the dangers of bird flu, and recently re-polled to see if these perceptions had changed in three years.
While progress has been made, more than 20% of respondents would still kill and eat a sick chicken.
A hat tip to RoRo on FluTrackers for this report from the Phnom Penh Post.
Project seeks H5N1 awareness
Thursday, 01 July 2010 15:00 Khoun Leakhana
POULTRY farmers in three border provinces exhibited improved awareness of avian influenza following the introduction of a village-based education project, though in some areas more than 20 percent still say they would eat an animal found to be infected with the disease, according to survey results released this week.
The survey was conducted in three provinces – Prey Veng, Svay Rieng and Koh Kong – as part of a programme led by the NGO CARE International. Overall, it found that the farmers benefited from education efforts implemented by Village Surveillance Teams, or VSTs.
In 2007, farmers were interviewed in order to assess their understanding of the A(H5N1) influenza virus, commonly known as bird flu. In particular, the initial interviews assessed the farmers’ knowledge of how the virus spreads to humans and how diseased poultry should be disposed of.
THEY’RE NOT ONLY PROTECTING THE BIRDS. THEY’RE PROTECTING THEIR OWN FAMILIES.
When they were interviewed again at the end of a three-year pilot programme in 2009, the farmers demonstrated that they were better equipped to deal with avian flu cases.
In villages in Prey Veng and Svay Rieng, for example, the number of respondents who said they would kill and eat a bird if they were to find it sick was nearly halved, from 43 to 23 percent, according to the survey.
“We saw that there was a behaviour change,” said Cecilia Dy, CARE’s avian influenza project coordinator.
While they don’t get a lot of publicity, health education campaigns such as these by NGO’s like CARE, SAVE THE CHILDREN, Humanitarian Pandemic Preparedness H2P and others are taking place in remote regions all around the world.
These projects not only help to protect the people living in those countries, but they also help protect the world.
Every time a virus like H5N1 is denied a human host, it is also denied another opportunity to mutate and adapt to humans.
Something worth considering the next time you think about where your charitable contributions will go this year.
