Migrant Workers Should Avoid Live Bird Markets: Expert

Jakarta (Antara) - An Official from the World Health Organization (WHO) said Indonesian migrant workers should avoid live bird markets in foreign countries, particularly in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. "I think it is important for tourists or migrant workers to avoid live bird markets. I think it is particularly important currently in China, but also in live bird markets in general that have avian influenza scattered around," the chief of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza, Professor Anne Kelso, told Antara here on Tuesday. Anne said it is better for people who are in foreign countries to avoid live bird markets, especially when a dangerous virus arises. Anne added that the location can be the source of the greatest risk for a virus infection. The latest virus of avian influenza that had infected several birds and people in the area are of the H7N9 type, Anne said. "The cases that were detected in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Malaysia were 'imported' from China. So the infected people were exposed to the virus while they were in the mainland of China, and they were diagnosed when they went back to their home land," Anne noted. According to Anne, the virus infection is predicted to spread through birds. "So in the normal circumstances, for example just walking around in Hong Kong or Taiwan, the risk of infection by the virus is extremely small," she added. The professor said the possible entry of the virus to other areas is from the infected person who comes back from China and poultry trade with the country. "I think it is quite possible for somebody who comes back from China to be infected and another way the virus can come to Indonesia is from poultry," she said, adding that the people should quickly realize the condition and isolate the infected person from other people. She said the probability of the virus and the infection to travel through Chinese poultry to South East Asia is quite high due to the cross poultry trade in the border of China and Vietnam. "There is a lot of trade across the border. There can be a significant risk of infected poultry and it will bring the virus to Vietnam," the Professor said. Previously, an Indonesian migrant worker, namely Tri Mawarti, 36, was infected by the H7N9 virus in Hong Kong on December 2013. Tri is being treated in the Queen Mary Hospital and her condition is better. The Hong Kong administration had issued an alert level for the avian influenza and increased the status to a serious level. The administration also suspended poultry imports from China. (*)