Flu Police

Agriculture Department Faulted on Bird Flu Efforts
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr.

The Agriculture Department lacks a comprehensive plan for detecting avian flu in poultry and wild birds, its inspector general's office said yesterday.

In an audit, the office found that the department relied too heavily on voluntary testing by the poultry industry and reports from state agriculture departments.

A spokeswoman for the department, Hallie Pickhardt, said that the agency "agreed with everything in the report, and we're either doing it or going to be doing it."

The audit began before Congress passed President Bush's plan for dealing with a pandemic flu outbreak, which gave the department an additional $91 million to fight avian flu, Ms. Pickhardt said.

But she added that the agency had no plans to make the voluntary testing now conducted by the poultry industry mandatory.

"We're confident in the testing procedure they're implementing," Ms. Pickhardt said. "They've been working very closely with us. This is their livelihood, too, and they have no reason not to report the information."

Instead, the department will supplement the voluntary testing with its own checks, she said.

The audit also recommended more testing in live-bird markets (where mild avian flu infections have been found in the past) and at illegal auctions of fighting gamecocks. It also called for a plan to protect workers with vaccines and flu drugs if infected flocks needed to be culled.

In January, the National Chicken Council, an industry trade group, said that its members, which produce more than 90 percent of the country's chickens, would test every flock for influenza two weeks before slaughter.

Oh, they are going to police their own. We all know how well that works out.