GENEVA, Feb 10 (Reuters) - Genetic sequencing on the H5N1 avian flu virus from birds in Nigeria show it is virtually the same as that found in fowl in China and Turkey, a scientist said on Friday.

A laboratory in Padua, Italy carried out the test on behalf of two international agencies dealing with the outbreaks in animals, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE).

The H5N1 virus was found in dead poultry in northern Nigeria, the first time it has been detected in Africa after spreading across Asia and along the Black Sea.

"It is virtually identical to the birds in Qinghai Lake, China and the chickens in Turkey," Ilaria Capua, who carried out the genetic sequencing at the Padua laboratory, told Reuters.

"This is the full sequence of one sample," she added.

The World Health Organisation has said that the viruses from Turkey's first two fatal human cases were virtually identical to viruses from Qinghai Lake nature reserve in central China, where there was an unprecedented die-off of 6,000 migratory birds in April 2005.

(emphasis added)

From Reuters

Infinitely more important than Abramoff or Brown, not to mention Bradgelina or whatever.