Although bird flu outbreaks continue in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Near East, efforts to combat the disease on poultry farms are slowly proving successful, the United Nations agricultural aid agency said Thursday.

To date, 108 people have succumbed to the deadly H5N1 avian influenza virus, all in Asia, and more than 200 million birds have died from the virus or through culling, but a vigorous response on farms, particularly in Thailand, Vietnam and China, appears to have reduced the transmission of the disease from poultry to humans, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said in a statement released here.

Vaccination campaigns, such as the one carried out in Vietnam, have also played an important role in some areas, and owner compensation has encouraged timely reporting of new avian influenza outbreaks, FAO said.

FAO, along with the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), continues to urge governments to concentrate containment efforts on farms and to emphasize the role of human activities such as trade that are considered the main spreaders of the virus but can also be inspected, controlled and improved.

However, where wild birds threaten to introduce the virus, the Rome-based organization says little can be done to control their movement but that action should be taken to prevent their contact with domestic birds.

"The need to keep domestic birds away from wild birds has been widely recognized and efforts to do so have been implemented in many countries," said FAO chief veterinary officer Joseph Domenech.

Source: Xinhua