Andhra Pradesh Too Banned 'Chicken & Eggs' In The State

Not wanting to take a risk, the Andhra Pradesh government has imposed a ban on chicken and eggs in the state as a precautionary measure to Bird Flu outbreak in Telangana state.

AP deployed six teams on the border with Telangana to prevent the entry of poultry feed and chicks bred in Hyderabad hatcheries. “Yes, we are now stopping vehicles carrying poultry feed in addition to chicks, birds and eggs from entering AP. There is a possibility that poultry feed could also be infected by H5N1,“ said Dr P D Kondal Rao, head of the AP animal husbandry department. 

The six teams have been deployed on the Kurnool-Mahbubnagar, Suryapet-Vijayawada, Nagarjunasagar -Guntur, Miryalguda-Guntur and East Godavari-Khammam routes, Rao said, adding that the ban may remain in place for one month. The animal husbandry officials have also alerted the commissioners of sales tax and transport departments not to allow Telangana vehicles with poultry items into AP, said sources.

It was only after 39,240 birds perished that the state animal husbandry department woke up to the deadly avian influenza virus doing the rounds. The deaths of layer birds (used for egg production) took place in two poultry farms in Thorrur village of Hayathnagar mandal in adjacent Telangana state a full one week before the government declared the bird flu outbreak.

The state animal husbandry department, which was in the dark all this while, was finally informed about the outbreak by the central government's department of animal husbandry , dairy development and fisheries.

The break-up of poultry deaths that fell prey to the avian influenza include 80 (April 6), 160 (April 7), 400 (April 8), 1,600 (April 9), 2,500 (April 10), 17,500 (April 11), 9,000 (April 12) and 7,500 deaths (April 13) respectively , as per records sourced with INNLIVE.

“This is a glaring example of how the government officials had utterly failed in reporting the disease, which is mandatory for all notified diseases including H5N1, as required under The Prevention and Control of Infectious and Contagious Diseases in Animals Act, 2009.The stakeholders must be held accountable,“ said citybased wildlife expert Dr C Srinivasulu.

In fact, Section 4 of the Act states that it is obligatory for the owner or any person in charge of any animal which he has reason to believe to be infective of a scheduled disease, to report the fact to village panchayat or villager officer, who in turn has to report it to the government veterinarian.

However, it is learnt that nothing of this sort happened with top officials of the directorate of animal husbandry , Telangana, admitting that neither their veterinary assistant surgeon Anand Reddy nor two village livestock officers (VLOs) of Hayatnagar mandal had any inkling of the outbreak.

Interestingly , Dr Y Thirupathaiah, additional director, directorate of animal husbandry , gave a clean chit to their officials. “Our people cannot be blamed as the burden of sharing information about the outbreak vests with the village officer and the panchayat.