Home > Official: H5N1 may be in human food chain
Health Agriculture - Fishery - Animals Environment
James Sturcke and agencies
Friday February 9, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
The Food Standards Agency confirmed today that it was investigating the possibility that turkey meat contaminated by bird flu at a Bernard Matthews poultry farm has entered the human food chain.
The government’s chief scientist, Sir David King, said the agency would be considering ordering supermarkets to remove packaged turkey from shelves after it emerged that Bernard Matthews had been transporting turkey meat from Hungary to the Suffolk farm where the H5N1 strain of the virus was discovered.
The environment minister Ben Bradshaw warned that legal action could be launched following the latest developments and possible breaches in bio-security at the plant.
"As part of the investigation into what might have caused the outbreak of bird flu in a Suffolk poultry farm, the agency will check that no infected meat has got into food," the FSA said in a statement.
"Our advice that avian flu does not pose a food safety risk remains unchanged. However, it is illegal for infected meat to be in our food and so the agency would take any appropriate action if it were found to be there.
"The investigation will include arrangements at the farm’s adjacent plant for food processing and whether infected meat has got into the food chain."
Initial tests have shown that the strain of avian flu involved in the outbreak that led to the culling of 2,600 turkeys at the Suffolk farm is H5N1 and may be identical to the variety responsible for two serious outbreaks in Hungary last month.
Sir David confirmed that the latest scientific findings suggested the "most likely scenario" was that the virus had been brought into the UK by dead poultry rather than by wild birds, as originally thought.
"What this means is that the likelihood of this being transferred directly from Hungary to Suffolk via fresh meat is probably the one that we have got to look at the most carefully," he said.
"I would be confident at this point saying it is probably the poultry, and then we know that fresh meat has been transferred from a plant in Hungary to the farm in Suffolk."
Mr Bradshaw said the government was investigating whether there had been "bio-security breaches" at the plant.
After a meeting of the cabinet’s emergency contingency committee, called Cobra, this morning, he said the Hungarian authorities were examining whether contaminated produce had come in from a slaughterhouse close to the restricted area.
"Bernard Matthews have been open with us about that, but we need to investigate that further," he said. "The Hungarian authorities are themselves embarked upon such an investigation today.
"We are investigating reports that there may have been some bio-security breaches at the plant. We can’t go into the details of those today because it’s possible that legal action could follow."
Last night, the Observer revealed that a consignment of dead turkeys from a Bernard Matthews-owned plant in Hungary could be the source of the outbreak.
The consignment of meat, which was partly processed, was brought by lorry to the UK, arriving a few days before January 27, when the first signs of illness were spotted in turkey chicks at the farm.
After a week in which the company denied there was any avian flu link between the Bernard Matthews plants in Suffolk and Hungary, a spokesman admitted last night that birds had been sent from Hungary to Suffolk after two serious outbreaks of H5N1 in Hungary last month. The potential link between Hungary and the UK was first raised by the Guardian on Monday.
Meanwhile, Bernard Matthews himself has postponed the collection of an honour from the Queen. He had been due to pick up a Commander of the Royal Victorian Order (CVO) award for services to charity today from Buckingham Palace at an investiture.
But shortly after the discovery of the virus in Holton, he asked for his appearance to be moved.
"Mr Matthews was due to come to receive his CVO for charity work from the Queen but contacted us to postpone his investiture, for understandable reasons," a palace spokeswoman said.
Mr Matthews, who already has a CBE, was made a CVO in the New Year honours list. The award is in the Queen’s personal gift and is given in recognition of service to the royal family.