Kolkata: The People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA) said on Thursday that the bird flu outbreak in West Bengal was a disaster waiting to happen as wrong methods of poultry farming are being practised in the state.
PeTA campaigns manager N G Jayasimha told reporters: "Animal factories, such as broiler sheds and battery hen warehouses virtually invite the virus to strike. Because of the animals' intensive confinement, the deadly strain spreads easily."
The bird flu epidemic has now affected nine districts of the state with Animal Husbandry Minister Anisur Rehman stating that Rs 50 million has been sanctioned by the government to prevent the disease from spreading any further.
Jayasimha said World Health Organisation (WHO) experts believe the H5N1 virus could eventually mutate into a communicable disease among human beings, potentially setting off a catastrophic pandemic worldwide.
Jayasimha said that in a letter dated June 17, 2007 sent to the animal husbandry department of the state government, PeTA had warned the authorities of an imminent bird flu outbreak if the handling of poultry was not changed.
"What the government is doing now is not the solution, it is the disease. The cause lies in the inhuman manner in which the poultry farming was being done. The entire breeding process, be it the animal factory or backyard poultry, works as a catalyst to spread the disease. We placed the whole thing before the government and nothing happened," he said.
"Now we have filed an application under the Right to Information Act to see what the status is. We have done an intensive study across India for five years and we have given authentic documents about the hatcheries, broiler chickens, common infectious chicken diseases, laying hens, de-beaking, forced moulting, fatty liver haemorrhaegic syndrome and cage layer fatigue," he said.
"These reports matter more for West Bengal as the northeastern states and West Bengal have the maximum backyard farming," he added.
He also stated that the WHO has negated wild birds as the cause for the spread of the deadly avian influenza.
"Chasing them is a waste of time. We should reform the rural poultry practices," he said.
Jayasimha said PeTA does not expect that the culling will be done methodically according to the norms prescribed by the Bureau for Indian Standards.
"They are supposed to be given sedatives before they are culled painlessly. But what we see is just the opposite. In some places the birds are buried alive and they are seen crawling out of their graves," he added.
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