They pose a threat to public health (From Bucks Free Press)

They pose a threat to public health

1:03pm Friday 16th July 2010 in

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Last week, Editor Steve Cohen wrote an impassioned column opposing Wycombe District Council’s decision to cull pigeons in High Wycombe town centre. At the end of the piece, he offered WDC the use of this column to reply to the criticism. This is the council’s response:

Thank you for the invitation to reply to your comment piece in last week’s Star about our proposal to capture and cull pigeons, before introducing a hawk as a deterrent to scare the remaining population away. I would like to take this opportunity to explain the potential public health issues caused by pigeons.

The proposed culling will take place under a general licence issued by Natural England. The stated purpose of the licence granted is to “preserve public health”. As you rightly said, the fouling of buildings or the nuisance caused by pigeons are not in themselves reasons to carry out a cull. Unfortunately though, much of this fouling is on domestic balconies and around food premises in the town, where people could come into contact with faeces either directly or through potential food contamination. This is also true of the fouling that is present in our public spaces where people consume food in the open on a daily basis. While adults are aware of the risks of contamination and the requirement to wash their hands, this is not always true of the younger members of our community who are especially vulnerable to disease.

I would like to remind you about the successful prosecution that we made earlier this year in respect of a food premises in the town centre. We were concerned that inadequate proofing in respect of pigeons had been carried out and this presented a risk to human health by contamination. As such we took action to minimise the problems caused by pigeons without resorting to culling; however proofing is not always possible.

Pigeons, along with other animals, are potential transmitters of disease from their faeces. A high proportion of pigeons are affected by psittacosis caused by the bacterium Chlamydophila psittaci, which can cause an acute generalised respiratory disease in humans. Fortunately to become infected with psittacosis close contact is required with the affected birds and infection from wild birds is not usual. Pigeons are also carriers of Salmonella, which can be a very severe form of food poisoning. They are also carriers of Campylobacter which causes acute diarrhoea and is the commonest reported bacterial cause of infectious intestinal disease in England and Wales, and the source of the majority of infections remain unexplained. The pigeons themselves do not show any symptoms of infection and while it is not usual to show humans have become infected by direct contact with a pigeon, bacteria can be spread by aerosols or indirect contact through food and water contamination. As such infection by these bacteria and others such as E. coli from pigeons does, without doubt, pose a real threat to public health.

We are satisfied that by carrying out the pigeon cull and introducing a deterrent, we are protecting the health of the residents and visitors to our town. The diseases I have mentioned are very common and people suffer from them every day and as a result, we think that we should do what we can to reduce the risk from infection on behalf of our community.

Councillor Clive Harriss, Wycombe District Council, Cabinet Member for Wellbeing and Neighbourhoods.