Bird flu detected in village close to Agartala
Routine sampling of blood and faecal extracts from backyard poultry in Tripura has detected the highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu virus, infecting birds in a village, 130 km from the state capital Agartala. The virus was isolated from Kalachari village in Mohanpur block just before it started to cause largescale mortality among birds. The samples, that were picked up on April 16, were found to be positive with H5N1 by Bhopal's High Security Animal Disease Laboratory on April 19. However, the final notification of a new outbreak in Tripura was issued by the Centre only on Monday night.