WorldPoultry: Mexico suffers another bird flu outbreak

Two outbreaks of highly pathogenic bird flu virus have been reported on egg farms in Mexico, resulting in the culling of nearly 300,000 birds, a recent report to the OIE states.

In total 740 poultry died from the virus which emerged in the two egg farms located in the central state of Aguascalientes. The virus, is reported to be the highly pathogenic avian influenza serotype H7N3, different from the deadly H5N1 strain, which has devastated duck and chicken flocks after it was first detected in 1997 in Hong Kong.

In September last year devastating outbreaks of H7N3 occurred in the northeastern part of the state of Jalisco, which is near Aguascalientes.

The ministry said it was still doing active and passive surveillance at national level and that epidemiological investigation was ongoing. The source of the outbreaks or origin of the infection was still unknown.