(ANSA) - Cabinet ministers made a show of tucking into chicken for lunch here on Saturday in a bid to allay consumer fears over bird flu. Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti, Agriculture Minister
Gianni Alemanno and Labour Minister Roberto Maroni all mumbled "excellent" as they chomped their way through Italian chicken breasts and drumsticks in front of a crowd of journalists and photographers.
Alemanno stressed that "our poultry industry, which is unbeatable for quality and safety, risks being brought to its knees all because of a phobia. Bird flu cannot be transmitted through food. We can happily eat as much chicken and turkey as we want because it's all produced in Italy," he said.
The ministers were in the northern town of Cernobbio for a farm industry conference organised by farmers' union Coldiretti. Coldiretti sounded the alarm earlier this month saying that more than half of Italian families had changed their food buying habits because of fears over bird flu. It said that poultry consumption had plunged 32% while the price of chicken had fallen 40%.
Coldiretti Chairman Paolo Bedoni protested that Italy's poultry industry was at risk because of an "irrational psychological reaction .This reaction is devastating for chicken farmers... It must be remembered that eight out of ten Italian families used to eat chicken on a regular basis," he said.
Italy's 6,000 poultry farmers are hoping the situation will improve thanks to a new law which requires poultry products to carry labels specifying the country of origin. The head of Italy's national bird flu crisis centre, Ilaria Capua, also complained that there was "too much alarmism" in Italy.
She stressed that chicken and eggs were safe to eat and that the bird flu virus "only affects people in a rare and sporadic way." According to bird flu experts, the virus is killed during the cooking process.
They stress that all uncooked chicken meat should be handled hygienically, which includes washing surfaces carefully after contact with the raw meat and preventing it from coming into contact with other raw foods.
They also advise washing the outside of eggs and cooking them properly. Alarm is growing around the world over the spread of a deadly strain of bird flu known as H5N1. Concerns increased in Europe this month after H5N1 spread to European Russia, Turkey and Romania through migratory birds.
H5N1 has killed about 60 people and millions of birds in southeast Asia since 2003. Most of the victims caught the virus from infected birds but scientists fear the flu could soon become transmittable between humans, sparking a lethal pandemic.
The World Health Organisation has warned all countries to be on the alert and step up measures aimed at containing possible bird flu outbreaks. The Italian cabinet has approved a decree aimed at tackling the risk. The decree provides for the hiring of 60 extra vets and 50 other livestock experts to deal with the potential crisis.
The government plans to step up border controls on poultry imports, crack down on food smuggling and boost personnel at NAS, the food and health control division of the Carabiniere police.
The decree also sets aside 50 million euros to buy 35 million shots of bird flu vaccine. An effective vaccine against H5N1 has yet to be developed but the government says it is collaborating with three major drug companies. It plans to contribute 5.5 million euros towards the companies' research into a vaccine against H5N1.
Italy's accords with the pharmaceutical companies are in line with recommendations by the EU, which has urged governments to make pre-purchase deals with drug firms to buy vaccines once they become available.
According to the results of a study presented last month at the second European flu conference, up to 16 million people could be affected by a bird flu epidemic in Italy with some two million requiring hospitalisation. As many as 150,000 Italians could die from the virus, the report said.
Bird flu, also called avian flu, is a highly contagious viral disease which can be 100% fatal among fowl. All types of birds are susceptible to the virus but outbreaks occur most often in chickens and turkeys.
One of the greatest problems in containing bird flu is that it can be carried by migratory wild birds carrying no symptoms of the disease. At present, the symptoms of bird flu in humans are similar to regular flu but pose a greater risk to people with respiratory complications and illnesses.
