Indian health officials said on Friday no flu-like symptoms had been found in any person in a western Indian state where 70,000 chickens are being killed to contain a second outbreak of bird flu in poultry, Reuters reported. The latest outbreak -- in backyard poultry of Jalgaon district in Maharashtra state -- was the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain of avian influenza, but it has not infected people so far. "We have not yet found anyone with flu-like symptoms despite a very intense door-to-door search," T.P. Doke, Maharashtra's health director, said. Authorities had identified four villages spread over 1,100 square km (425 square miles) in the Jalgaon area as affected. Jalgaon is 200 km (125 miles) from Navapur, where India reported its first case of the H5N1 strain in poultry last month. After the first outbreak, India tested more than 100 people for bird flu but all proved negative. Vijay Satbir Singh, Maharashtra's top health official, said authorities would check 80,000 people over the next two weeks to ensure the virus did not infect people. "We will continue our surveillance for 10 days after the last bird has been culled in Jalgaon," he said. Veterinary workers had throttled almost half of more than 70,000 birds and said they hoped to complete the culling by late Friday.
