BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) - Tests confirmed H5N1 in three birds found dead in Hungary, making the country the seventh EU nation with an outbreak of the deadly strain of bird flu, officials said Tuesday. Austria, Germany, Greece, Italy, France and Slovenia also are grappling with H5N1 in wild birds, the European Commission said Tuesday. So far, no EU nations have reported bird flu in commercial stocks or in humans.
EU veterinary experts met in Brussels to discuss ways to keep bird flu from infecting domestic fowl as the lethal virus spreads across Europe. But EU governments failed to agree Tuesday on a plan to vaccinate commercial poultry.
Some countries, including France and the Netherlands, are pushing for flu vaccines for domestic poultry. But others, including Britain, say vaccinations are costly and difficult—and provide no guarantee of immunity since the drugs only ward against the flu in general, not H5N1.
"The use of poultry vaccines to guard against the spread of H5N1 will inflict huge costs on poultry farmers, cause undue distress to poultry and, owing to the difficulties of catching free-range poultry, may not act as a blanket solution," Neil Parish, a British Conservative member of the European Parliament, said in Brussels on Tuesday.
H5N1 has devastated poultry stocks and killed at least 92 people, mostly in Asia, since 2003, according to the World Health Organization.
In India, health workers were wrapping up a massive slaughter of chickens Tuesday.
Most human cases have been linked to contact with infected birds. But scientists fear the virus could mutate into a form that is easily transmitted between humans, sparking a human flu pandemic.
Farmers said consumers were shunning poultry amid the bird flu scare.
Germany reported 22 more cases of bird flu on the northern island of Ruegen, raising its total to 103.
Austria said Tuesday that an EU reference laboratory in Britain confirmed that a wild swan found dead last week had H5N1. Preliminary tests in Austria also indicate that three other swans and a duck discovered in the southern province of Styria also have bird flu, said Peter Wagner, the top veterinarian in the province.
Results from the EU laboratory also confirmed H5N1 in three dead swans in Hungary, government spokesman Andras Batiz said in a statement. Hungary is awaiting results from samples taken from four other swans suspected of carrying H5N1.
All seven birds were found some 100 miles south of Budapest, near Hungary's borders with both Serbia and Croatia.
"The government and the competent authorities have already implemented the steps needed to guarantee the population's safety and prevent the spread of the disease to domestic birds," Batiz assured the country.
Greece and Slovakia said more wild birds have tested positive for an H5 subtype of bird flu, and further tests were being conducted to determine the exact strain.
Elsewhere, Croatia on Tuesday reported a new case of H5N1—in a swan found dead in Ciovo off the country's southern coast, the country's second outbreak since October.
European countries stepped up precautions. In Paris, the Jardin des Plantes park closed its aviary, and the Bois de Vincennes zoo on the capital's outskirts devised duck-proof feeding boxes for their flamingos. A wild duck tested positive in France for H5N1.
In London, the six legendary ravens at the Tower of London were moved indoors. Britain so far has been spared bird flu, but wardens are taking no chances—legend holds that the British monarchy will fall if the ravens ever leave the Tower.
"It's purely precautionary," Derrick Coyle, the tower's Yeoman Raven Master, said Tuesday. "I always said that if bird flu got as far as Germany, I would put the birds inside."
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Associated Press writers Jan Sliva in Brussels, Belgium, and Jill Lawless in London contributed to this report.
