b'Avian Influenza(Bird Flu)What is it? While the UK sees multiple cases of bird Avian influenza (bird flu) is a highlyflu on farms each year, most are the less contagious viral disease affecting theserious low pathogenic strains 9 . The largest respiratory, digestive and/or nervousand most serious outbreak occurred at systems of many species of birds. It isa Bernard Matthews farm in 2007, when caused by a Type A influenza virus, which160,000 birds were gassed to death to has many subtypes. New subtypes andtry to prevent the H5N1 strain of disease strains arise when the virus undergoesfrom spreading. More than 2,000 of the genetic mutations. Some forms of the viruscompanys birds died in one week inside cause mild reactions in people while others,one overcrowded shed 10 . Despite the birds such as H5N1 and H7N9, can be fatal. severe suffering, the first victims went unnoticed because the attrition rate in History intensive poultry sheds is always so high. In its natural state, the virus has existed forThe industry acknowledges that some millions of years as a harmless, intestinal100 viral, bacterial and musculoskeletal infection of aquatic birds, such as ducks.conditions commonly affect commercial It was first discovered among farmedpoultry 11 .poultry in Italy in the 1870s. Farms provide a perfect environment for viruses to mutateThe highly pathogenic H5 virus has not and, in an overview of avian influenza,gone away. There were 24 outbreaks in researchers wrote in a Food and Agriculturedomestic poultry in six European countries Organization paper, intensive rearing ofbetween 30 December 2019 and 18 January poultry has played a role in the emergence2020. 12of highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses 8 . The H5N1 subtype first infected people in 1997 during an outbreak in Hong Kong. Since then, this highly pathogenic disease-causing strain of the virus has spread from Asia to Europe and Africa, resulting in millions of poultry infections and several hundred human cases, some of which were fatal.6'