Bird flu: Over 300 poultry birds to be culled in Ranchi today

A rapid surveillance team formed by the district administration on Sunday following the confirmed cases of bird flu in the capital on Friday evening has identified a little over 300 poultry for culling in a one kilometer infection zone.

Since morning, various teams have taken to the streets to raise awareness through loudspeakers about the dos and don'ts of the H5N1 scare, while surveillance teams at the epicenter have been carrying out massive disinfection and cleaning, in addition to poultry identification.

Sources from the monitoring team said, “We have identified about 310 birds within a radius of one kilometer today. The culling will take place tomorrow. The site surveyed includes the infected zone (ground zero) and also a radius of one km from it.” Ranchi is now the second district after Bokaro to have a confirmed outbreak of the virus, putting the entire state on high alert ahead of Holi. 

The epicenter in Ranchi was Union Tribal Affairs Minister Arjun Munda's house in Jail More chowk, where about a dozen chickens died in the backyard on February 27. On February 28, the samples were sent to Calcutta for testing and then to Bhopal. On March 1, reports confirmed an outbreak of bird flu.

The district administration today formally notified seven rapid surveillance teams and deployed magistrates in each of the seven zones for bird flu containment measures. According to a formal order issued on Sunday, the sale of all types of poultry within a radius of 1 to 10 km from the infection zone is prohibited for the next 21 days. Within a radius of one km, curbs will also apply to households.

“Today we have asked everyone to volunteer details of poultry or poultry products they have at their places for slaughter. The government will pay compensation for the losses from the district disaster management coffers,” the official informed.

Meanwhile, many restaurants and eateries stopped serving chicken and switched to mutton and fish. “Until further orders, we have removed eggs and chicken from our menu. Public health is more important than business,” said Ram Kumar, owner of a restaurant in Kutchery.

At Albert Ekka chowk, roadside vendors selling chicken parotha have switched to mutton variants and hiked prices by Rs 20. “Tala chicken paratha is priced at Rs 80. We replaced it with mutton and priced it at Rs 100,” said a vendor.