Chicken culls
- From: "Pat Gardiner" <patgardiner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 4 May 2006 10:11:47 +0100
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25149-2164281,00.html
The TimesMay 04, 2006
Chickens could be suffocated in flu outbreak
By Valerie Elliott, Countryside Editor
MILLIONS of chickens could be killed by suffocation if an epidemic of avian
flu in Britain threatened human health.
Emergency legislation was placed before Parliament during the May Day Bank
Holiday giving Margaret Beckett, the Rural Affairs Secretary, the power to
order "ventilation shutdown" at chicken farms. This would remove oxygen flow
from chicken houses.
Birds could take up to a day to die, depending on their age and size and the
time of year. Death would be caused by a combination of overheating, bird
flu and lack of oxygen.
The plan has outraged animal welfare organisations, which are demanding
clarification about the method of slaughter. Compassion in World Farming
(CIWF) and the RSPCA said that the powers were in breach of standards laid
down by the World Organisation for Animal Health, based in Paris. They are
demanding to know under what "exceptional circumstances" the method could be
used.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) confirmed
last night that an amendment to the Welfare of Animals (Slaughter or
Killing) Regulations 1995 gave the authority for such a cull. A spokesman
said that it was "not the method of choice" and would be used only if state
vets had no other means to remove infected birds quickly.
In an epidemic, however, and if human infection were a possibility, Defra
fears that some poultry workers may decline to help in the usual methods of
culling - rounding up birds by hand, stunning them and humanely gassing them
in a mobile chamber. The plan is certain to put Mrs Beckett and Ben
Bradshaw, the Animal Welfare Minister, on a collision course with many
Labour backbenchers and Opposition MPs.
Peter Ainsworth, the Shadow Rural Affairs Secretary, condemned the move as
"barbaric", and expressed anger about the secrecy in drawing up the new
powers.
"Issuing emergency powers on a Bank Holiday weekend is not the way to go
about business and we would not support a policy of deliberate suffering
that is inhumane," he said.
Philip Lymbery, the chief executive of CIWF, said: "Ventilation shutdown is
likely to be no better than simply burying birds alive, and is therefore
totally unacceptable on welfare grounds.
"Any outbreak of avian flu has got to be dealt with swiftly and efficiently,
of course, but also humanely."
John Avizienius, the RSPCA head of farm animals, said: "It's hard to
conceive of a scenario where this would be needed, but the RSPCA would not
endorse ventilation shutdown as a humane method of slaughter. We also have
concerns about how 'exceptional circumstances' would be interpreted."
Peter Bradnock, the chief executive of the British Poultry Council, said
that the industry had not been consulted on the powers. The Times has
learnt, however, that approving death by suffocation during an epidemic may
be an attempt to win approval for the gassing of entire chicken houses
during a virulent avian flu outbreak. State vets and industry chiefs believe
that gassing flocks would be the quickest and most humane form of slaughter
if the deadly flu virus took hold.
Trials took place in Northern Ireland last autumn, when a combination of
carbon dioxide and argon emerged as the fastest and kindest method of
killing.
During the less virulent H7N3 alert last week a gassing trial took place in
Norfolk, organised by the Scottish Executive. It is understood that state
vets, the fire brigade and Health and Safety Executive officials monitored
the use of gas in an empty shed. The aim was to find out how much gas would
be needed to ensure that birds were killed, and how best the gas should be
introduced into a unit.
The method was used in the Netherlands three years ago to wipe out most of
30 million birds kept on commercial farms producing chicken for human
consumption.
Farmers and poultry companies have welcomed the trials, saying that culling
birds quickly could be vital in an outbreak of avian flu.
About 118 million chickens are kept in commercial units; only about eight
million are free range. There are also about another 30 million that are
reared indoors for their eggs.
On some of the 2,000 farms in Britain there may be more than a million birds
at any one time, with about 55,000 kept in sheds 300ft long and 80ft wide,
and from 7ft high in the eaves to 15ft in the middle.
Regards
Pat Gardiner
www.go-self-sufficient.com
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