Bird flu virus found in cat in southern Austria

VIENNA, Mar 6 (Reuters) A cat in an animal sanctuary in southern Austria has tested positive for the H5N1 bird flu virus but was yet to show any symptoms of the disease, Austria's health minister said today.

The cat was among 170 cats kept in cages next to birds including a swan that died of the disease and chicken and ducks found to have the virus after they were culled last month, Health Minister Maria Rauch-Kallat told a news conference.

''All the cats have been brought to a quarantine station,'' Rauch-Kallat said. ''Those 170 cats are now being closely monitored. We are expecting important observations as to whether they will become ill, or are just carriers of the virus.'' Animals carrying H5N1 without showing any signs of ill health could make it harder to detect and contain bird flu. The longer the virus remains in a mammal, the greater too the risk of it mutating into a more dangerous form.

Bird flu remains essentially an animal disease which humans contract through close contact with infected birds. It has killed 95 people since late 2003.

However, the virus is mutating and there are fears it may eventually change enough to be transmitted easily from human to human, sparking a pandemic in which millions could die.

Saliva samples from 40 of the cats were tested for H5N1 after the outbreak at the ''Noah's Ark'' sanctuary in the city of Graz. Initial tests were positive for three of them, but later tests confirmed the virus only in one.

The remaining cats will now be tested as well as all the dogs at the sanctuary.

Johann Thalhammer, a professor at Vienna's veterinary university who will monitor the cats, said it was not clear how the infected cat had caught the virus. It was also not known when it had become infected and if it had been carrying the virus before it was brought to the sanctuary.

Germany last week reported the first European case of H5N1 bird flu in a domestic cat on the northern island of Ruegen, an area where several wild birds have died from the virus.

Experimental studies suggest the cats could be infected with the virus when they eat the raw meat of infected birds.

The World Health Organisation said much still needs to be learned about cats and their possible role in spreading bird flu but so far there have been no examples of cats infecting humans.

REUTERS CH KP2340