The village of Joyeux in the French department of Ain (01) has come into the national limelight on Friday for being the country’s first area to find birds killed by the H5N1 virus. The village is located between Geneva and Lyons. French Agricultural Minister, Dominique Bussereau, as well as a flock of journalists were on site on Saturday to show that authorities were taking the issue seriously. The Tribune de Geneve says that the village of 200 inhabitants has discovered another 15 suspicious birds over the weekend. The Tribune interviewed the canton of Geneva’s doctor in charge of infectious diseases, Philippe Sudre, who said it was only a matter of weeks before we find infected birds in Geneva. Gottlieb Dandliker, cantonal authority for wildlife, explained that with cases in Austria and neighboring France it was likely that the disease was already here. Scientists are keen to highlight that the illness has not affected humans in Western Europe and remains a veterinary problem, for now. Migros, Switzerland’s largest supermarket retailer, is up in arms about the way the bird flu issue has been treated by Swiss authorities. Indeed, the company says that its poultry sales have dropped by 20% over the last week. Migros spokesman, Urs-Peter Naef, torched officials in Sunday’s «Sonntags Zeitung» for having a flip-flop communication policy that scared locals.

<< Geneva News Archive