Public health must come first, says EU official

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Despite habitual close contact with poultry and fears of huge losses by businesses in relation to the threat of avian flu, public health must remain the priority, a visiting official from the European Union (EU) said.

"You eradicate, you cull, vaccinate, and compensate," said health commissioner Markos Kyprianou on Wednesday, before ending a visit to Indonesia. Responding to questions on Europe's experience in handling the threat of avian flu, and earlier, mad cow disease, Kyprianou, the EU's commissioner for public health and consumer protection, said that "one must be realistic."

"It's impossible to have inspectors everywhere at the same time detecting diseases in animals. Public cooperation is very important. And for the public (farmers) to cooperate they need to feel they will receive fair compensation."

The EU has announced a planned grant of 30 million euro (US$35.5 million) for a number of Asian nations including Indonesia as part of its assistance to fight bird flu, which has so far killed seven people -- including two non-confirmed cases -- in Indonesia, and it is feared it will be spread beyond Asia by migratory birds.

Minister of Agriculture Anton Apriyantono has repeatedly said that mass culling of poultry here is not feasible given the lack of funds needed to compensate farmers, opting so far for mass vaccinations and selective culling of fowl in certain areas. Action plans include deploying troops to help check for infected birds.

The World Bank has also offered unspecified financial assistance to Indonesia to conduct a mass cull of poultry to curb the spread of the H5N1 virus, which has even been detected in healthy chickens.

After meeting Minister of Health Siti Fadilah Supari, Kyprianou also cited the challenge in Indonesia, as in other countries he recently visited such as Vietnam, in raising public awareness of the dangers of bird flu.

"Here the big challenge is to explain that despite customs and tradition, and close contact with birds, these could be a potential threat to public health; so some things will have to change."

Commenting on Indonesia's plans to deal with bird flu, Kyprianou said implementation is very important.

"Indonesia has plans to develop cooperation with international organizations. It's important that these plans, which are strategic, be transformed into concrete actions," he said.

Local officials have only suggested that farms be moved out of Indonesia's dense towns, where slaughterhouses are commonly found in the middle of residential areas, and where raising chickens in residential neighborhoods is widespread.

Again responding to questions on the experience in Europe, Kyprianou stressed the importance of "explaining to people the accurate problem, so they are not too relaxed and not too panicked." In the recent handling of avian flu, he said Europe went from complacency to "two months of panic" when the virus was detected in Romania, despite earlier warnings.

The situation needed a global response.

"It's not a local or regional problem, but a global issue. It requires global cooperation," Kyprianou said.

The EU will channel the 30 million euro through a multi donor trust fund to help countries. Individual countries from the EU may provide more funds, he said.