THE government is coming under pressure to order British poultry flocks to be brought indoors after a duck with bird flu was found just 400 miles away in France.

Wildlife experts and virologists warned that wildfowl migrating from southern France could bring bird flu to Britain this spring. They estimate that some 200 pairs of pochard, the species found infected with the H5N1 virus in France, are likely to make the journey to Britain in the next few weeks.

Professor John Oxford, a virologist at Queen Mary’s School of Medicine and Dentistry in London, said Britain’s 30m free-range birds needed to be protected.

“From an infection point of view it makes sense to pull the birds in now,” he said. “We are not talking about for ever, just for the next few weeks while the risk from migrating birds remains.”

Some countries, including Holland, Sweden and Norway, have already drawn up plans to bring their poultry flocks indoors even though they have not had any incidents of infection with the H5N1 virus.

Indian officials said last night that eight people were being tested for the H5N1 virus after the discovery of the strain in Maharashtra state. Health minister Anbumani Ramadoss said test results were expected in 72 hours. He added that a cull of up to 500,000 birds in the affected area was planned.

Under Britain’s contingency plans, birds would only be moved inside if there were an outbreak, a stance supported by poultry farmers. Fred Landeg, the government’s deputy chief veterinary officer, said that while the risk from migrating birds had increased, existing bio-security and surveillance precautions were sufficient.

However, Peter Cranswick, a government adviser from the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust at Slimbridge in Gloucestershire, noted that extensive surveillance had failed to detect the virus in Germany and France. He said: “There is a chance that H5N1 has already been circulating undetected in Europe.”

Infected pochard discovered on a reserve on the Dombes plateau, near Joyeux, northeast of Lyons, could have come into contact with mallards, wigeon and teal in the area, all of which migrate to Britain in small numbers during the spring.

The avian flu is believed to have moved westwards into central and western Europe as more than 15,000 mute swans fled an unusually cold spell in the Black Sea region.

Spring also brings an influx of millions of smaller birds from Africa, including Nigeria where avian flu is ravaging chicken farms. However, experts believe the risk from these birds is small because they rarely come into contact with waterfowl and poultry.

State vets and wildlife experts are closely monitoring the southeast of England for wild birds infected with the virus. Confirmation of the case by the Veterinary Laboratory Agency in Weybridge, Surrey, means France has become the seventh EU country with cases of H5N1 in wild birds.

Last night France’s food safety agency, AFSSA, “confirmed the presence of a highly pathogenic H5N1 on a duck found February 13th”. France and Holland want to vaccinate all poultry, and their plans will be considered on Tuesday at a meeting of experts in Brussels. Britain remains opposed, saying it could mask the spread of any infection.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is planning a simulation exercise to test the country’s preparedness for an avian flu outbreak. It will be carried out on April 5 and 6, beginning three days after an imaginary outbreak of avian flu on a farm at Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk.

It will be followed by two further primary outbreaks near York and on the Welsh borders, before birds are deemed infected up and down the country.

A co-ordination centre will draw together experts from dozens of government organisations with the aim of tracking and defeating the disease. They will be responsible for ensuring poultry living within a one-mile radius of any birds with avian flu are culled.

Local disease control centres will also be set up in Bury St Edmunds, Leeds, Cardiff and Gloucester. It will be primarily a “table top” exercise, although one farm is likely to take part to test protective clothing.

Observers will monitor the performance of officials and produce a report this summer. Andrew Joret, vice-chairman of the British Egg Industry Council and one of the contributors to the exercise, hinted that their task would not be easy. “It felt like I was writing a script for EastEnders,” he said.

A similar contingency plan codenamed Operation Arctic Circle was tested last year to assess the impact of a human pandemic. Officials in the East Midlands quickly concluded that mass mortuaries would be needed.

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