German Military Joins Fight against Bird Flu
Date: 21-Feb-06
Country: GERMANY
Author: Louis Charbonneau
Sixty Bundeswehr soldiers specialising in chemical, biological and nuclear contamination situations, clad in disease protection suits and gas masks, disinfected vehicles in bird flu protection zones on the Baltic island of Ruegen.
Four times as many soldiers were sent to the Baltic coast in the east German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on Monday to help gather up corpses of dead birds to prevent a wider outbreak of the disease.
"Two hundred and fifty soldiers from all branches of the armed forces and military officials from Mecklenburg-Vorpommern will assist the coast guard in the collection of bird corpses," the coast guard said in a statement.
The coast guard also said that the military was using Tornado reconnaissance aircraft to search for bird corpses along the Baltic coast.
The military was called in after days of mounting media criticism that the local authorities were moving too slowly.
The number of dead birds from the wild on Ruegen infected with H5N1 rose to 79 over the weekend and worry that the disease would spread to farm birds has hit fever pitch in the media.
On Sunday evening authorities confirmed the disease had spread to the mainland despite intensive efforts to contain it on Ruegen. The Agriculture Ministry said two dead birds on the mainland had the H5N1 disease, bringing the total to 81 cases.
So far the disease has not been found in any of Germany's 15 other states.
German Agriculture Minister Horst Seehofer told reporters in Brussels before a meeting with his European Union counterparts that Berlin's top priority was to contain the H5N1 outbreak.
"The important thing is that we gain control of the situation on Ruegen," he said, adding that this was why the Bundeswehr had been asked to get involved.
"Everything now depends on stopping the disease from spreading further. This is why we need to get the dead birds out of the water as quickly as possible," he said.
Sections of the sparsely populated resort island that lies 200 km (120 miles) north of Berlin have been closed to the public and the entire island was put under close observation.
Local authorities on Ruegen officially declared a state of catastrophe for the island.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel inspected the island on Sunday and described the situation as grave.
Bundeswehr spokesman Commander Michael Buesching warned that the army could only do so much to halt the spread of H5N1.
"We cannot offer 100 percent certainty. Migratory birds fly where they want to," he said.
(Additional reporting by Volker Warkentin and Carsten Lietz)
