29 Oct 2008

Bird flu outbreak exercise begins

11:45 am on 29 October 2008

New Zealand's ability to cope with an outbreak of bird flu is being tested on Wednesday in an exercise at Auckland International Airport.

Exercise Spring Fever is based around the scenario that a plane arrived with suspected influenza patients aboard.

More than 20 health, border control and Government agencies will be involved as if the outbreak was real.

The Ministry of Health says the exercise is designed to test how prepared New Zealand is for a global influenza pandemic.