5. Statement by the Minister for Rural Affairs and North Wales, and Trefnydd: Avian Flu

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:10 pm on 8 November 2022.

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Photo of Lesley Griffiths Lesley Griffiths Labour 4:10, 8 November 2022

Diolch. I'll start with the questions around public health risk, because obviously I hadn't been asked those questions before, and it is good to be able to reiterate that the UK Health Security Agency's advice is that the risk to public health from this virus is very low, and the UK Food Standards Agency's advice is that AI poses a very low food-safety risk for UK consumers. Properly cooked poultry and poultry products, and that obviously includes eggs, are safe to eat. No bird-to-human transmission of AI either—. Well, it's very, very rare, but we certainly haven't seen any cases here. Over many years, we've only seen it a very, very small number of times across the UK. So, just to reiterate, the risk to the wider public from AI continues to be very low, but I would like to say that no-one should pick up or touch a sick or dead bird. Instead, just report that to the Animal and Plant Health Agency. 

I certainly won't be following England's lead, as you put it, as I said in my answers to Sam Kurtz. What I do is listen to my chief veterinary officer, just as the Scottish Minister listens to hers, and obviously the UK Government Minister listens to hers also. And the advice I've been given at the moment is that mandatory housing is not required at the current time. That might change, particularly if we do see cases of AI into the spring, which we certainly think we may have. We have had no let-up this year. It normally starts around October, as I said in my opening statement, when we see these migrating birds, and, unfortunately, I think we've had cases across the UK, predominantly in England, every month for the past year. When I referred to two cases since October, you might wonder why I said that, but that's how the counting starts; the counting starts on 1 October. So, we're now into the second year, if you like, of the outbreak that we've unfortunately had.

So, as I said in my earlier answers, this is reviewed on a daily basis, and the mandatory housing, if we believe it is necessary, I will certainly not hesitate. I've done it before; it's not an issue of not wanting to do it. We do it when the chief veterinary officer and the scientific advice that he has tells us that we should do it.