Bird flu psychosis growing in Europe
Web posted at: 3/4/2006 2:13:48

PARIS: A French mayor banning chicken from school canteens, Germans abandoning cats by the hundreds, Greeks and Italians virtually axing poultry from their diets are all signs that a worried Europe is inching toward what some have called a bird flu psychosis.

In Austria, a provincial hospital in Burgenland has even reserved 20 per cent of its beds for possible bird flu patients, even though no human infections have been reported anywhere in Europe.

Indeed, despite assurances from officials that health risks are negligible, an edgy public is taking its own, not always rational, precautions against the deadly virus.