A central government official is confident the bird flu that killed more than 1,000 migratory birds in Qinghai province will not spread to domestic fowl or infect humans.
Jia Youling , director-general of the Ministry of Agriculture's veterinary bureau, said there were no signs of infection among the 2.18 million domestic fowl in the province or any cases of human infection.
'The rumour that the bird flu affected people in Qinghai has been proven false by the Ministry of Health,' Mr Jia said in Beijing yesterday.
The Ministry of Agriculture received a report from Qinghai on May 4 that migratory birds had been found dead in the Qinghai Lake Nature Reserve in Gangcha county, and two weeks later the national Avian Influenza Laboratory identified the H5N1 bird flu virus.
Qinghai is on the seasonal migratory route of birds from Central Asia to the South Asian subcontinent. The affected wild fowl included bar-headed geese and great black-headed gulls.
In the absence of world guidelines for preventing and controlling bird flu in migratory birds, veterinary authorities took precautionary measures and blocked roads leading to the infected areas to stop the disease from spreading.
