More than 150 farms affected by avian flu in France


21 new farms were affected in just 24 hours.

France now has 151 farms infected with avian flu, two-thirds of them in the Landes department, we learned Thursday from the Ministry of Agriculture. In just 24 hours, 21 new farms were affected by highly pathogenic avian influenza, known as bird flu. “The virus is active and circulating. The Landes are particularly affected due to the concentration of farms in this department“, we explained to the ministry.

In detail, of the 151 infected farms, 94 are in the Landes, 28 in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, 16 in the Gers, eight in the North, two in Vendée and Hautes-Pyrénées and one in Lot-et-Garonne. . In addition to farm contamination, 21 cases were detected in wildlife and five backyards were affected. France has around 20,000 poultry farms raised for meat, eggs or foie gras.

SEE ALSO – Avian flu in France: poultry will spend the winter confined

The virus was identified for the first time in breeding on November 26 on a farm in the town of Warhem (North) where 160,000 laying hens were raised all year round in buildings. At the end of December, the bird flu had already led to the slaughter of around 650,000 poultry in one month. The balance sheet on January 13 for the slaughter of ducks, geese and other poultry was not yet known.

Like last year, the Southwest concentrates most of the cases. In 2021, the crisis – the third since 2015 – had ended up being stemmed at the cost of the slaughter, often preventive, of more than 3.5 million poultry, mainly waterfowl.



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