AS WE PREPARE for the festive season, anticipating the steaming aromatic turkey or duck taking pride of place on the family dinner table, that much-treasured moment is threatened by the recent arrival of bird flu among commercial turkey populations in Ireland.

Bird flu outbreaks have significant financial implications to commercial poultry farmers, as well as to wildlife parks housing captive birds. Egg prices soared around the world earlier this year in both Europe and the US as outbreaks threatened the industry. However, the potential threat to humans is also a real concern.

Europe has been hit by a spike in bird flu outbreaks this autumn, with 15 out of 27 countries reporting outbreaks on farms this season. There has been an unusually high number of outbreaks (688) compared to 189 last year – raising fears for commercial flocks, with particularly high numbers of cases reported in Germany and France.

Now, Irish poultry farm’s worst fears have been realised with the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain of the virus being detected in commercial poultry farms in Carlow and Kells, Co Meath. These are the first outbreaks in farms in Ireland in three years and have sparked an immediate uptick in biosecurity measures in an attempt to curtail further spread.

There is now a race to lockdown poultry before further cases emerge. The Netherlands, Belgium and France imposed a nationwide compulsory housing order for captive birds and commercial poultry flocks in October, while England followed suit on 4 November and Ireland on 10 November.

Further biosecurity measures include three kilometre protection zones around the affected farms with a wider 10km surveillance zone around the sites. Access to the sites will be limited, with disinfected footwear and separate clothing for different areas on the site. Any movement of birds in and out of these zones requires a vet certificate.

In 2024, a polar bear in Alaska tested positive for bird flu, while at the opposite end of the world on Antarctica,........

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