Poultry farmers urged to dispose of dead chicken scientifically

Vijayawada: Expressing concern over the large number of deaths of chicken in poultry farms across the state, director of animal husbandry Dr T Damodar Naidu appealed to the poultry farmers to dispose of the dead chicken in a proper way to prevent more deaths.

He said in a statement here on Tuesday that there are eight crore commercial chicken in poultry farms and two crore domestic chicken at homes across the state. The casualties are more in poultry farm chickens rather than domestic chickens.

Generally, every year the death of poultry chicken would be very low between December and February. However, there are more this year due to the severity of various diseases.

The large number of migration of birds to Kolleru Lake in West Godavari this year might be one of the reasons for these deaths.

More deaths and the spread of disease were reported in that region as the deceased chickens were not properly disposed of by the poultry farmers without taking bio-security precautions. 

The animal husbandry department launched a massive awareness programme to dispel fear among people regarding the usage of chicken and eggs due to these deaths. The department officials are also extending precautionary measures and medical advice to the poultry farmers.

The scientists of the department collected the samples from the dead chicken and sent the same to the state-level laboratory at Vijayawada and the High Security Lab at Bhopal for confirmation of the diseases.

The director stated that it was not proved with evidence that the chicken and eggs were harmful to the humans. He appealed to the people to consume chicken and eggs without any hesitation.