The bird flu virus that has hit several countries in Asia is likely to spread to Europe, the Middle East, south Asia and Africa, the UN food agency warned today, urging nations at risk to increase surveillance and prepare national emergency plans.
The most immediate threat from the virus is to poultry farms, but its spread also provides more opportunities for it to mutate into a form that could be dangerous humans.
French President Jacques Chirac warned a co-ordinated international response to bird flu was "absolutely necessary" as the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation reiterated the virus is likely to be carried over long distances by wild water birds.
Birds flying from Siberia, where the virus has recently spread, may carry the disease to the Caspian and Black Seas "in the foreseeable future," the Rome-based FAO said.
"These regions and countries in the Balkans could become a potential gateway to central Europe for the virus," the agency said in a statement.
FAO said bird migration routes also run across Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, Georgia, Ukraine and some Mediterranean countries and said bird flu outbreaks in these areas were possible.
It said India and Bangladesh, which currently seem to be uninfected, are also considered to be "at risk."