The virus spreading around the world should not be called "swine flu" as it contains avian and human components and no pig has so far been found ill with the disease, the world animal health body said. It would be more logical to call the virus "North American influenza", a name based on its geographic origin like the Spanish influenza, a human flu pandemic with animal origin that killed more than 50 million people in 1918-1919. "The virus has not been iso-lated in animals to date. The-refore, it is not justified to name this disease swine influenza," the Paris-based World Organisation for Animal , Health, also known as the OlE, said in a statement. The European Commission said that the virus was not linked with pork. Robert Madelin, director-general of the Commission's health and food safety department, said in Brussels that no European Union trade restrictions on imports were planned since swine flu had nothing to do with the food chain. The EU only imports insig-nificant numbers of live pigs and pigmeat products are not seen as a disease threat. The World Health Organisation has ruled out any risk of infection from consuming pork, saying swine flu has not been shown to be transmissible to people through eating properly handled and prepared pork, or other products derived from pigs. Fears of a global flu pandemic grew after 103 people were killed in Mexico and new infections were found in the US and Canada and possible cases as far afield as Eu-rope, Israel and New Zealand. The OIE, an intergovernmental organisation, warned that if the virus was shown to cause disease in animals, this could worsen the regional and global public health situation.Denmark, a major pork producer that exported nearly 2 million tonnes of pigmeat in 2008, said it was not putting any extra controls in place on pigs or introducing extra measures relating to pork production as a result of the flu threat.
Business Line, 29th April 2009
No comments:
Post a Comment