Avian flu: the risk level from high to “high” in France

The level of bird flu risk in France is still rising. According to one stop published in the Official Gazette on Tuesday, it went from “moderate” to “high” throughout the metropolitan area, forcing farmers to confine their poultry. The main production regions, Brittany and Pays de la Loire, but also the department of Deux-Sèvres, were subject to this obligation as early as mid-October. But the epizootic has continued to spread in recent days.

This virus, which can affect almost all bird species, wild or domestic, was discovered in Gard in particular last week, in a family farmyard in the town of Fourques, near Arles. A few weeks earlier an outbreak had already been detected in the Dordogne.

“The situation is exceptional due to its size and the period in which the surveys are in progress,” the Ministry of Agriculture explains on its website. “Environmental contamination remains high in regions where wild bird mortality is observed and the spread of this contamination can occur through settling movements of wild bird populations,” he adds. .

Almost 22 million animals slaughtered

A first outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza was detected at the end of November 2021 in a laying hen farm in the North Department. It then spread to several departments in the southwest and the Great West, then a new infection area developed in the Lot, Dordogne, Corrèze, Haute-Vienne and Lot-et-Garonne in late March. At the end of July, the virus resumed affecting French farms at an exceptionally early stage.

While at the end of October the last census carried out by the ministry reported 36 outbreaks of avian influenza in livestock, the assessment carried out this week evokes 49. In the direction, about 21.8 million animals (palmipeds and poultry) of this crisis have already been slaughtered .

Something to rock the industry. “No farming is spared,” Yves-Marie Beaudet, president of the National Egg Promotion Committee (CNPO), complained Wednesday at a press conference. “It’s something that makes you shiver,” he added, warning of the risk the epizootic poses to egg production. According to the president of the Vendée Chamber of Agriculture, Joël Limouzin, “the farmers are traumatized, some stop producing”.

The hope of the vaccine

According to him, the profession is eager to see the deployment of vaccines being tested in Europe, the only way to deal with a virus that has become “endemic”, with which it will be necessary to live in the long term. Otherwise, he wonders “how to continue” producing if millions of animals are to be killed every year.

The participation is also financial for the state, which must in particular bear the compensation for the losses of the professionals. Even before the epidemic resumed this summer, the bill for avian flu already amounted to over € 1 billion for public finances.