The vaccination campaign against avian flu should start during the month of October, said Monday the Minister of Agriculture Marc Fesneau during a trip to Gironde. “I repeat, in October we will be able to vaccinate”, declared Marc Fesneau in front of the press, on the sidelines of a meeting with representatives of the Bordeaux vineyard in Salleboeuf, about twenty km east of Bordeaux.
“If we can save time we will”
At the end of May, the chambers of agriculture of four departments of the South-West as well as the interprofessions of foie gras and lean poultry in the region had called for “a deployment” of the vaccine “in the heart of summer” to ensure “survival” local duck and poultry farms.
“I fully understand the despair. If we can save a little time we will, but to say today, as before for the vaccine against Covid-19, that we can shorten the timetables is not serious. “, explained Marc Fesneau, listing the processes of validation, manufacture, deployment and storage of the vaccine, to be put in place before launching the campaign “in good order”.
81 farms contaminated in May in Gers, Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques
After several years of successive crises caused by avian flu, the virus has been circulating again since the beginning of May in Gers, Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques, with 81 infected farms, more than half of them in Gers, according to the count of the authorities at the end of May. “Obviously, we passed the peak, because we took very strong measures, of this episode”, estimated the Minister of Agriculture Monday.
Two vaccines tested in France have already proven to be “very effective” on ducks bred for foie gras, the health security agency (Anses) reported on May 25, paving the way for a national vaccination campaign. “from the fall”, according to the first estimates of the ministry. During the previous epizootic in 2022-2023, six million poultry were slaughtered in France according to the ministry, after 22 million in 2021-2022.