bokaroranchi the state animal husbandry department on saturday confirmed that the mysterious death of crows and poultry in gomia block of bokaro and mehrama block in godda were due to avian flu the department had on january 28 sent samples to national institute of high security animal diseases nihsd bhopal which said the tests confirmed the same dr vijay singh director of the animal husbandry department said singh said in gomia bird flu has affected crows while in godda the tests were positive for crows as well as poultry chicken we have asked the administration to keep a vigil on the situationthe mysterious death of crows has become a major cause of concern for residents of gomia where rotting carcasses of these birds have become a common sight district animal husbandry officer arun kumar sinha said we have now collected swabs of poultry and sent them for tests to confirm if bird flu has affected chicken it is safe to consume eggs and chicken because they are cooked at very high temperatures there is no need for panic he said response teams led by veterinary doctors have been constituted in each blockstate health family welfare and medical education department has issued directives to all the district hospitals to screen people if they show any symptoms of swine flu the surveillance officers at all the districts have been directed to collect samples for test viral transport media vtm kits have been available at all staterun medical colleges including rims mgmch jamshedpur and pmch dhanbad to ensure that patients can be tested within 2448 hours of suspected infection an advertisement has been issued for publication in all dailies so that people can be made aware about the diseasespeaking to toi state surveillance officer of integrated disease surveillance program idsp rakesh dayal said we have alerted all the district hospitals to maintain buffer stock of medicine and vtm kits have been supplied to them we have also set up isolation wards at all the medical colleges and have directed the district surveillance officers to contact medical colleges in case of any detection