During last winter and spring, avian flu wreaked havoc on duck and poultry farms, leading to the slaughter in France of 21 million animals. After a summer of respite, the first cases are appearing in the Southwest. An individual who raises ducks in momber, in Gironde bought, without knowing it, contaminated animals in a barnyard in Seine-et-Marne. His 79 ducks had to be euthanized, the prefecture said.
To avoid any risk of spreading the virus to other farms, regulated protection and surveillance zones have been set up within a radius of 3 and 10 kilometers by prefectural decree. Nearly thirty municipalities in the north of the Gironde are concerned, in an area still far from the breeding areas of the poultry industry, located further south in the region.
A month ago, a first case of avian influenza was detected in Gironde: a dead and infected wild goose was discovered in a park in Blanquefort. The other cases in France, are for the time being mainly in the Great West, in total 18 French farms have been contaminated since the beginning of August according to a latest report from the Ministry of Agriculture.