Brussels, 13/12/2005 (Agence Europe) - At the joint meeting of Chief Veterinary Officers and Chief Medical Officers in Brussels on 12 December, the European Centre for Disease Protection and Control (ECDC) discussed health and safety at work measures to protect people working with chickens in Europe from bird flu (farmers, vets, laboratory staff etc). Eight rules are designed to protect workers liable to come into contact with the bird flu virus. A series of measures are needed to control animals, restrict the number of people involved in poultry culling, isolate infected individuals and take technical measures to ensure hygiene and cleanliness of contaminated areas. In countries where there has already been an outbreak of the virus or where there is a suspected outbreak, specific prophylactics need to be used, but these are not required in countries where there have not been any known outbreaks. Vaccination against this season's flu is highly recommended for people who may come into contact with the H5N1 virus to cut the risk of contracting both viruses at the same time (bird flu and human flu) and avoid the risk of the two combining to form a new potentially pandemic virus. The percentage of people infected by bird flu in Asia remains very low (around 130 cases in total) compared with the number of people working with chickens. Local veterinary and medical staff are responsible for risk assessment and have the difficult job of deciding who runs the risk of being exposed to the virus.