Click to play videoNew Delhi: The bird flu seems to be spreading in West Bengal with one person showing symptoms of the virus being kept under observation in the North Bengal Medical college at Jalpaiguri.
With the virus being detected in Cooch Behar as well, a total of nine districts of West Bengal are under the scanner.
It has also spread to Hooghly, on the outskirts of Kolkata.
Culling operations are on with about 640 teams dedicated for it. But 21 lakh birds in the affected areas are yet to be culled. An additional Rs 8.50 crore has been sanctioned for controlling the situation.
The state government has also requested for 1000 medics from neighbouring states to assist them.
Over the last couple of days, bird flu has been confirmed in North and South 24 Parganas, Nadia, West Midnapur, Birbhum, Malda and Dinajpur. Around 20 million people live in the infected areas.
"Samples of chicken sent from Cooch Behar and Hooghly districts on Tuesday tested positive at the Highrisk Security Disease Laboratory (HSDL) in Bhopal," West Bengal Animal Resources Development Minister Anisur Rahaman said. "We have been informed by the Centre. Steps will be taken accordingly," he said.
Reports suggest that the Bihar government has also ordered culling of chicken in six panchayat areas of Katihar district, adjacent to bird flu affected Malda district of West Bengal.
The Bihar government has also banned import of poultry from West Bengal.
"We have put a blanket ban on import of birds from West Bengal in the wake of reports of the dreaded H5N1 virus spreading there," Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi said.
The repercussions of the bird flu outbreak in West Bengal is also being felt in Tamil Nadu as several countries have stopped importing eggs from India.
Tamil Nadu exports 5.5 crore eggs per day but now countries are reluctant to import eggs from India.
Though, no case of bird flu has been reported in Tamil Nadu so far, reports say 22 containers of eggs are held up in the Arabian Sea as some Middle Eastern countries have banned the imports.
For the Tamil Nadu government the focus now is on precautionary measures. It says it's routinely sending blood samples from dead chicken for testing.
(With inputs from Sougata Mukhopadhyay)
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