Tests conducted after 60,000 infected turkeys culled in British Columbia

Vancouver, B.C.

-- Canadian authorities are conducting tests to determine the pathogenicity, subtype and strain of H5 bird-flu virus that infected 60,000 turkeys euthanized last week on an Abbotsford farm.

The presence of H5 does not mean there is an outbreak of H5N1, the most dangerous H5 strain that has killed nearly 250 people in Asia, Africa and Europe since 2003, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) says.

Veterinary experts believe the turkeys in the Fraser Valley poultry-producing area near Vancouver and just north of the border with Washington state probably were infected by migratory fowl, and that the strain is likely low-pathogenic.

The infected turkeys were placed inside two barns, which were then flooded with carbon dioxide, the recommended humane method, supervised by federal and provincial animal-welfare and veterinary experts. The birds will be composted inside the barn and temperatures checked to ensure the virus is destroyed. The CFIA covers all costs and owners are compensated at market value.

An area within about a two-mile radius around the infected farm was under quarantine, involving about 23 farms. Future movement of birds and poultry products from quarantined areas for any purpose requires a negative flock test for avian flu.

The Washington (state) Department of Agriculture tested for the virus at 13 farms a few miles south of the area as a precaution. Washington has never had a confirmed case of bird flu.