Fears mount at epicenter of Japanese bird flu outbreak

Friday, March 12th 2004, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

TAMBA, Japan (AP) _ Men in white protective suits, masks and hoods moved along the hillside above a chicken farm, spraying disinfectant and throwing lime into a massive ditch filled with thousands of dead birds.

This mountain-ringed town in western Japan is the epicenter in the country's mounting struggle with avian flu, which has compounded worries about the food supply and provoked a scare over the possible spread of the disease to humans.

Those fears have expanded in recent days with the discovery of five wild crows infected with the virus _ raising the threat that the freely roaming birds could trigger an uncontrollable spread of the disease.

``That's really worrying,'' Kaoru Iwamoto, a 55-year-old housewife, said just a few blocks away from a farm being disinfected. ``You can control where the chickens go, but crows fly all over the place.''

The avian flu hit Japan in January for the first time since the mid-1920s. It has infected chickens at three farms and led to the deaths or extermination of more than 300,000 birds.

So far, Japan has been lucky with no cases of human transmission. The disease has spread to people in Thailand and Vietnam, killing 22 and prompting the cull of about 100 million chickens across Asia.

The flu scare is hurting chicken and egg sales in Japan. Wholesale chicken prices have dropped nearly 28 percent in the past two months.

A recent survey by Kyodo News service showed more than 60 percent of respondents were concerned about the safety of poultry. Japan has imposed bans on chicken meat imports from several countries where avian flu has struck, including the United States and Canada.

The disease in Japan has hit hardest in Tamba, a farming community near the ancient capital of Kyoto and about 230 miles west of Tokyo.

The flu scare erupted in the town late last month, after authorities received an anonymous phone call alerting them that chickens at the sprawling Asada Nosan farm were dying en masse.

Thousands of birds had already died, and the owners faced allegations of covering up the disease, shipping live chickens and eggs off to market even after it was clear something was amiss. Under threat of prosecution, chief owner Hajimu Asada, 67, and his wife, Chisako, 64, hanged themselves this week on one of their farms.

The disease showed up on another farm about three miles away, and two dead crows found in the area tested positive for the H5N1 virus. Two more crows near Kyoto and one in Osaka, 25 miles away, tested positive this week for the related H5 virus.

The Kyoto Prefectural government reacted by calling in about 800 members Japan's Self-Defense Forces, who helped exterminate and bury some 270,000 chickens and disinfect the affected farms.

The spread has upset residents concerned about their children and fearful the infections among crows could herald mutations of the disease that could affect household pets _ and then their owners.

Crows are a common pest in Japan, especially in the cities. Tokyo alone is inhabited by 24,000 of the black birds, which feed off garbage. Many more live near chicken and pig farms, where they feast off the scraps uneaten by livestock.

Authorities assume the crows in Tamba were infected while mingling with sick farm chickens.

Masato Kusakabe, 39, a teacher at the local elementary school, said officials had disinfected the school chicken coop and were telling children not to touch any crows.

``We're a little worried it might spread to other animals,'' Kusakabe said after escorting home a group of children who live near one of the farms.

The government has reacted by threatening new fines against farmers who don't report suspected outbreaks. It has urged farmers to cover flocks of chickens with nets to keep crows out, and dispatched investigators to South Korea to coordinate efforts to track migratory birds.

Authorities are urging calm.

``In everyday life, we don't think that the virus can be transmitted from crows to humans,'' Kyoto Gov. Keiji Yamada said in a statement this week. ``So we're asking everyone to react with a cool head.''