Authorities in the eastern German state of Saxony said today that tests have confirmed for the first time the presence of the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus in domestic fowl.
Earlier a spokesman for the state social affairs ministry said preliminary tests taken at a poultry farm with more than 14,000 turkey and geese showed the presence of the H5 virus and that follow-up tests were underway to determine whether it was the highly-pathogenic H5N1 strain.
It was not immediately clear that the confirmation of H5N1 was referring to the same poultry farm in Saxony.