Policy Statement & Submission

17 June 2004
Our Ref: CC117


Mrs Carrie Yau, JP
Permanent Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food
10/F Citibank Tower
3 Garden Road
Hong Kong


Dear Mrs Yau

Prevention of Avian Influenza: Consultation on Long Term Direction to Minimise the Risk of Human Infection

Thank you for the opportunity of commenting on the above. We have consulted our members, especially those of the Chamber's Retail and Distribution Committee, and our views are set out as follows.

Avian influenza is a highly infectious, pernicious, and, in some cases, deadly disease. We fully agree with the Government's view in Chapter 4.14 of the Consultation Paper that Hong Kong “cannot afford to experience another avian influenza outbreak that could lead to a major health incident”. Furthermore, we agree, as acknowledged in Chapter 2.3, that “the protection of public health should and must remain our number one priority”.

One of the lessons we have learned from the SARS outbreak is that the dense nature of habitation in Hong Kong together with dated design and poor maintenance of buildings and poor hygiene in some areas, have made possible and, in the case of SARS, contributed to a serious epidemic in the community. Avian influenza has the potential to be as damaging as SARS.

It is clear that human contact with live poultry and slaughtering in close contact with humans poses serious health risks. Exposure of Hong Kong's densely populated community to a large amount of live poultry must be avoided.

The Chamber thus agrees with the Government's views in Chapters 2.1 and 4.12 that “the most effective way to minimize the health risk posed by avian influenza is to reduce as far as possible the contact between humans and live poultry”, and that “as long as there is still close contact between humans and live poultry, the risk to human health posed by avian influenza cannot be underestimated.”

We believe that central slaughtering (Approach A in the Consultation Paper) is the only option available to the Government if the protection of public health is really given first priority. Hong Kong simply must move to central slaughtering and the concept of the “cold chain” should be applied to the sale of the poultry meat at retail outlets.

We acknowledge that there will be persons in the poultry trade who will be affected by the move to central slaughtering and we are sympathetic to their economic plight. On the other hand, we believe that the affected persons can be adequately compensated by the Government as set out in Chapter 6.5.

If the Government were to decide to adopt Approach B, then this would call in a number of questions.

(i) It would be difficult to reconcile with the stated claim that public health was government's number one priority.

(ii) The risk to human health posed by avian influenza would have been underestimated.

(iii) It would not have been possible to achieve the goal of reducing as far as possible the contact between humans and live poultry.

(iv) The standards of our poultry industry would remain at third-world level, which would be unbecoming of a city that aspires to become Asia's World City.

(v) By satisfying the economic interest of 6,500 persons in the poultry trade, the health risks for 7 million people would not have been alleviated.

I hope you will find the above comments useful.


Yours sincerely




Dr Eden Woon
CEO