Most bird flu samples are ‘unfit for testing’
Thursday, March 16, 2006 01:18 IST, by Aditya Ghosh

MUMBAI: The spread of bird flu in Maharashtra could be worse than feared.

HK Pradhan, head of the High Security Animal Diseases Laboratory in Bhopal, said it is not possible to get a clear picture of the spread of the disease because the state’s officials have failed to follow proper procedures while collecting and preserving samples for testing.

He said many of the samples reaching Bhopal are in such a state that it becomes impossible to get a positive result even if they are infected. As a result, there is no proper figure about the spread of the virus.

“A sample has to reach us where the virus is alive in the medium (dead chicken, blood, egg, tissue, or faecal matter) by maintaining a cold chain and following a strict protocol like time of collection and packaging,” Pradhan told DNA from Bhopal. “But many of the samples come in such a nasty condition that it is not possible for the virus to be alive. So, it will not give a representative figure.”

He narrated the example of one sample that was so bad that scientists had to dump it straight in the incinerator without even opening it.

The four samples that tested positive on Tuesday were from a batch of 26, all from a scattered, domesticated population. Though the samples showed the presence of the H5 virus, their N1 status has not been tested. “But it is quite certain that they will test positive for N1 as well,” Pradhan said.

This means the virus is still in the environment and a direct link exists, as H5N1 cannot transmit without a live carrier. “It is transmitted from bird to bird and not through air,” he said.