Jan. 17, 2004 – A day after the Thai government affirmed that the country is free of avian flu, an epidemic of which has struck several neighboring countries, a consumer rights group has accused Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s administration of misleading the public about the poultry sector’s true condition.
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On January 14, Deputy Agriculture Minister Newin Chidchob admitted that about 200,000 chickens have died of diseases, but he stressed that the cause is either bronchitis or cholera and not avian flu. He also disclosed that about 200,000 have been slaughtered to prevent the transmission of diseases, Agence France Presse reports.
The Consumer Force Association claimed that the figure is far lower than the actual number of poultry deaths. The group cited a report of the Kasikorn Research Center, which revealed that a mysterious disease claimed the lives of some 40 million chickens. Its chairman, Viroj Na Bangchang, told AFP that Thai authorities bribed chicken farm owners, who believed that their stock actually succumbed to bird flu and not cholera or bronchitis, with 40 baths (one dollar) per chicken for them to remain quiet.
The Association sent a letter on January 15 to the parliament urging the government to stop covering up the epidemic and consider the public’s health and welfare above that of the economy or tourism. The letter asserts that the disease is now endangering several Thai provinces, namely, Nakhon Sawan, Nakhon Pathom, Suphan Buri and Chachoengsao, says the Bangkok Post.
Despite the appeal, the Thaksin administration reiterated that the disease has not reached Thailand. The deadly bird flu epidemic has already infiltrated Thailand’s neighboring countries such as Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Vietnam, which is considered to be the worst hit by the disease. Only Vietnam, which has culled some two million chickens so far, has human deaths linked to the bird flu, which now total to four, according to the BBC.
The agriculture ministry rebuked the Kasikorn report and has decided to take legal action against the private research house for publishing "false figures" on the mass chicken deaths in the country. Newin said that the government plans to seek damages for the harm done to the poultry industry as a result of the alleged false information, The Nation, a Thai news daily, reports. Thailand is one of the world’s top exporters of poultry products, according to Xinhuanet.
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In the same Nation release, Newin conceded that in 383 poultry farms, about 847,000 chickens have died or been killed, with a little less than 30,000 having suffered from fowl cholera and bronchitis between November 21, 2003 and January 16, 2004. The ministry’s livestock department said that weather changes caused the chickens to become weaker. The department’s director-general, Yukol Limlamthong, said that such conditions made the chickens easily susceptible to cholera and bronchitis, which explains the skyrocketing poultry mortality rates.
