Since last February 16, the country adds 26 cases of bird flu in wild, backyard and poultry birds, which is why the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Health and SENASA (National Service for Agro-Food Health and Quality) joined forces to combat the disease.
For this reason, state agencies held a virtual meeting with different provincial authorities to coordinate work and prevention actions against the fluthis after a positive case of bird flu in a broiler chicken farm in the province of Río Negro.
The Secretary of Agriculture, Juan José Bahillo, pointed out that in order to combat the bird flu it is necessary to “work in an articulated and coordinated manner” and explained that the “meeting had been scheduled before confirming this case in Río Negro, when we still had another sanitary status, unfortunately today we have to take commercial measures to respect the protocols”.
For her part, Health Minister Carla Vizzotti said that it is very important “to share information in common with all regions and authorities and work in synergy, in a unified message” and that “it is very important to be vigilant and in those places or provinces where more cases are detected to be permanently in contact with the Ministry of Health and SENASA”.
Meanwhile, SENASA explained that So far, 26 positive cases of influenza have been confirmed: 13 in Córdoba, 5 in Buenos Aires, 2 in Río Negro, 2 in Santa Fe, 1 in Jujuy, 1 in Neuquén, 1 in San Luis and 1 in Salta.; for which they stressed that it is very important to “coordinate actions and inform all regions.”
Regarding the farm where the virus was detected in poultry, the decision was made to quarantine the place for 28 days, in addition, raking and prevention work is carried out within a radius of 10 kilometers. To prevent the virus from spreading, the birds on the affected farm will be culled.
Also from SENASA they explained that although the illness It has not spread to the entire country, it has not yet been controlled, so they work hard so that, especially the production chain, it is not affected, “There are three very broad scenarios and the virus is circulating. We are trying to confine it to national parks and backyards and prevent it from entering farms”.
The Government will seek to reopen poultry exports
While SENASA urges the productive sector to reinforce the management, hygiene and biosecurity measures of its poultry farms and to immediately notify it of the detection of symptoms, on the other hand, they will begin negotiations with different countries to reopen exports.
This, given that, after detecting a case in a poultry, the country lost its disease-free status and had to self-suspend exports, as established by international standards. In this way, it is expected to expose the situation to the 55 buyer countries so that exports can resume as soon as possible, since Argentina exports 17% of its poultry production.
