WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 (UPI) -- Avian-influenza outbreaks have been reported in six more Ukrainian villages.
Following Tuesday's announcement of the imposition of a state of emergency covering the affected autonomous region of Crimea, Ukrainian officials have sealed off affected areas with a 2-mile exclusion zone and are culling domestic poultry within it.
About 28,000 birds have been seized in house-to-house searches, and officials are enforcing protective measures to include quarantine and the banning of movement of live birds from within the exclusion zone.
Meanwhile:
-- Vietnam Wednesday banned the sale of Tamiflu from pharmacies.
All medicines are available for sale over-the-counter in Vietnam, and officials are concerned that people may develop a resistance to the anti-viral before they have a need to take it if it is improperly administered.
-- Also on Wednesday, Vietnam confirmed a new outbreak of avian influenza in the country's poultry stocks.
The outbreak, which killed birds in the northern province of Ha Giang in late November, marks the 14th Vietnamese province affected by avian influenza since the beginning of October.
-- Another Romanian village in the Danube delta has confirmed an outbreak of an H5 strain of avian influenza among chickens.
Tests conducted on the dead birds on Sunday confirmed the presence of H5, but the samples are currently awaiting confirmation of H5N1 from British laboratories.
Romanian officials have quarantined all villages affected by avian-influenza outbreaks and are in the process of widespread poultry culls.
-- Turkeys on a farm in North Carolina have tested positive for a low-pathogenic form of avian influenza that poses no risk to human health.
The H3N2 strain found on the farm has been detected elsewhere in the United States this past year and is of no concern.
Ed Loyd, a U.S. Department of Agriculture spokesman, explained, "Bird flu is as common as the human flu. With attention on high (pathogenic forms) in Asia and Eastern Europe, there has been more attention on bird flu this year."
-- In response to consumer fears regarding the consumption of poultry, the World Health Organization and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization have reissued a statement confirming that there is no danger of contracting avian influenza from cooked poultry.
Even eating a bird infected with H5N1 does not pose a risk to the consumer as long as the meat was thoroughly cooked at a minimum temperature of 70 Celsius (158 Fahrenheit) and none of the meat is raw or red in appearance.
Cooked eggs are also safe to eat, although eggs from areas with outbreaks of avian influenza in birds should not be consumed with runny yolks.
