Thailand wages all-out effort to wipe out bird flu epidemic

MILLIONS of volunteers led by emergency teams fanned out across Thailand yesterday in a new drive to fight bird flu after the prime minister gave officials 30 days to eradicate the epidemic.

Scientists fear that if the virus mutates enough to mix with the human influenza virus it could easily pass between humans and trigger a global pandemic. Agriculture Minister Somsak Thepsutin said Thailand’s offensive against the disease “begins from this minute,” while international health experts warned that hopes to stamp out the disease in one month were unrealistic.

Thailand went on high alert on Tuesday when it reported that its latest bird flu victim died after likely contracting the virus from her daughter in the first probable case of human-to-human transmission. Ten people have died of bird flu in Thailand and 20 in Vietnam while more than 100 million chickens and poultry have died or been culled since a severe strain of the virus spread across Asia early this year.