NEW YORK, Feb. 5 (UPI) -- A group of scientists and wildlife health experts said Thursday that closing Asia's wild bird markets would reduce the spread of Avian flu.
Such markets place tens of thousands of wild and domestic birds in close quarters, allowing diseases to make the jump between animals and, ultimately, humans, said the group, from the Wildlife Conservation Society.
Wild birds are caught, usually by rural hunters, then brought together in large numbers often outside their natural range, and put in contact with other animals and people that have little immunity to diseases they might be carrying, the WCS said.
The trade in wild birds for the Asian pet and songbird trade is vast. In Bangkok's weekend market, for example, during 25 weekends in one year alone, 70,000 birds were sold representing 276 species from Asia, Australia, Africa and South America. In a single market in Java, Indonesia, between half a million and 1.5 million wild birds are sold each year
"The wild bird trade in Asia is conducted on an extremely large scale, and is highly fluid," said Dr. Elizabeth Bennett, WCS's director of hunting and wildlife trade. "The one common theme is that wild birds are being caught, sold and transported in very large numbers, and that effective controls, both in terms of laws and enforcement of those laws, are currently weak across much of Asia."
