EU expected to launch bird flu awareness campaign

EU health ministers were today expected to agree to launch a targeted public information campaign to raise awareness across Europe over bird flu and to calm fears of an imminent human pandemic.

A co-ordinated and targeted campaign was needed amid the deadly H5N1 virus’ spread among wild birds across Europe, said Austria’s Health Minister Maria Rauch-Kallat, who was chairing hastily arranged EU talks on the subject in Vienna.