Amur falcons take off from Nagaland, racing southwards and flying over three oceans to South Africa and onwards to Mongolia. The feathered frequent flier clocks 22,000km, outstripping the air distance between Delhi and San Francisco, the world’s longest commercial flight way, by nearly 8000 km. This brings joy to wildlife enthusiasts, but also makes the country vulnerable to bird flu, which has occurred 24 times across states since the first outbreak 2004. Government records show nearly Rs 400 crore have been paid to poultry farmers since as compensation for mass killing of birds. “H5N8 type is highly pathogenic but it isn’t known to transmit to humans,” a government official said, citing a World Health Organization (WHO) update on India.

Source: Hindustan Times October 27, 2016 07:02 UTC