Eastern India authorities announced that they will begin disposing of chickens and throwing away eggs in order to try and contain a new outbreak of the H5 bird flu, according to a released government statement on Tuesday. An unforeseen mutant strain of the H5 bird flu virus is currently spreading elsewhere in Asia.

West Bengal is a state that has been severely hit by bird flu outbreaks in the past, and thus the state is increasing the about of surveillance. The federal government is directing local authorities to halt the trading, transportation, and otherwise movement of poultry and chicken products. Also, the federal government is restricting access to areas that have been proved to be affected by H5 via samples that test positive for the virus.

A government statement announced that it was decided to instantly begin the culling of birds and destruction of eggs and feed material in order to control the spread of the disease.

Last month, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said that a mutant strain of the H5N1 bird flu virus was spreading in Asia and elsewhere, and they even cautioned us as to the possible reappearance of the bird flu. The new outbreak in India, however, is not clearly related to the new Asian strain.

Virologists have warned us that, unfortunately, there is no vaccine against the H5N1, a mutant strain of bird flu, that has recently been found in China and Vietnam. Many virologists have called for closer monitoring of this disease, in both farm chickens and wild birds, in order to try and stop it from spreading.

In 2006, Bird flu first broke out in India. Since that time, millions of chickens and ducks have been killed in order to contain the virus, and yet the virus continues to resurface from time to time. The Indian government did not give any more details regarding the exact strain of the flu that was recently involved with the outbreak in West Bengal.