Several new centres of H5 bird flu have been uncovered in Poland where emergency measures have been put into effect, officials said today.
The H5 bird flu virus was diagnosed in a dead swan found near a water-pumping station in the town of Kostrzyn on Odra, Krzysztof Jazdzewski, Poland's chief veterinary officer told a news conference.
A dead merganser (sea goose) infected with the H5 virus was later found in Poland's westernmost port of Swinoujscie, some 155 kilometres upstream from Kostrzyn, where the Odra empties into the Baltic, provincial spokesman Agnieszka Muchla said.
A further centre of avian influenza virus has been detected in a dead swan found in Bydgoszcz, 50 kilometres north-west of the northern city of Torun, where the first outbreak occurred a week ago.
The chief vet said a specialist laboratory in England had confirmed that the swans found a week earlier in Torun had been infected with the deadly H5N1 virus.
Standing emergency procedures are put into effect, wherever the bird flu virus is found, he added.
Special patrols began counting poultry and policing compliance with a ban on free-range birds in the surrounding countryside and disinfectant mats are set out on roads leading out of town.
The Kostrzyn pumping station lies at the edge of the Mouth of the Warta National Park, one of Europe's largest wetland nesting areas of migratory waterfowl.
The pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza virus has spread from Asia to Europe and Africa, infecting almost 200 people since late 2003 and killing at least 97 of them.