Bird flu strain found in France
Reuters
Feb 19, 2006

Spreading diseaseAvian influenza has flared anew in recent weeks, spreading among birds in Europe and parts of Africa, and prompting authorities to impose bans on the poultry trade, introduce mass culling and vaccinate poultry flocks.

Europe on alert

Germany and Austria have reported more cases of bird flu, while authorities in Bulgaria put a man in an isolation chamber and were testing him for H5N1 after two of his ducks died.
The disease has also spread to Egypt, which reported its first cases of H5N1 on Friday, while in Nigeria authorities are culling poultry and urging people not to eat sick birds after outbreaks there.
Indonesia confirmed on Saturday that a 19th person had died of bird flu, which has been reported in chickens and other domesticated fowl in most provinces of the sprawling country of 220 million people.
The H5N1 virus is known to have infected 171 people worldwide since late 2003, killing 93 of them. Two hundred million birds across Asia, parts of the Middle East, Europe and Africa have died of the virus or been culled.

Read the complete article

Learn more about travel medical insurance for covering emergency medical accident and illness when traveling abroad.