Bird Flue is a serious illness that affects birds, especially chickens, that can be spread from birds to humans and that can cause death. Recently the breaking out of bird flue has taken us aback. We could never think of such kind of problem in our country. However thanks to the Almighty that it could not break out in an epidemic form because of the timely intervention of the government and people’s consciousness about the matter. The cause of bird flue in our country could not be detected. It was thought that it might have been carried and spread by the imported chickens from our neighboring countries like Thailand and China-because the breaking out of bird flue in an epidemic form has been seen in China and Thailand. Poultry farming has had a positive effect on the socio-economic condition in our country. It helped many rural poor women to break the chain of poverty and see better days in their lives. But the recent breaking out of bird flue has shadowed their smiling faces into gloomy ones and clouded their foreheads. It has emptied their fertile farms and turned the firms into barren lands. We have seen the heart-rending cries of the people both male and female. Their cries have pierced our hearts.
There are lots of different strains of the bird flu virus. Most of them don’t infect humans. But there are 4 strains that have caused concern in recent years: H5N1 (since 1997), H7N9 (since 2013), H5N6 (since 2014), H5N8 (since 2016); Although H5N1, H7N9 and H5N6 don’t infect people easily and aren’t usually spread from human to human, several people have been infected around the world, leading to a number of deaths. H5N8 has not infected any humans worldwide to date. However, it is heartening that our government has taken an all-out effort to give loans to the people engaged in poultry farming on easy terms to keep their income-generating industry on and to bring about better days and see the gloomy faces glowing with a beatific smile and keep their heads above all-consuming poverty.
