BBC News : Japan reports third bird flu case

The agriculture ministry in Japan has confirmed a third case of the bird flu virus at a farm in Kyoto.
Officials said more than 60,000 chickens have died at the farm in the past week.
Ten Asian countries have so far been affected by bird flu, with at least 22 people killed in Vietnam and Thailand.

Japan had hoped to declare itself free of the virus, after gong almost a month without any new cases, since the first outbreak in mid-January.
But it has now suffered two more outbreaks, and there is a fourths suspected case under investigation in central Nagano province.

Animal experts meeting in Bangkok to discuss combating the disease said it would cost the minimum of $500m to stamp bird flu out in Asia and restock the region's poultry flock.
Although previous bird flu outbreaks in Europe and the United States took six months to be wiped out, in Asia it is proving difficult despite massive culling.

Animal health officials expect it will take at least a year, or perhaps longer before Asia is free of the disease.

"If there is no change in the intensity of the campaign and there is no international mobilisation to help the countries, it will take several years," said the head of the FAO's Animal Health Service, Joseph Domenech.