Dhaka, - Around 2,000 chickens have been culled in Gazipur and Noakhali following the detection of H5N1 virus, commonly known as bird flu.

Gazipur Sadar Upazila livestock officer Mohammad Shamsur Rahman on Saturday told bdnews24.com that the bird flu infection was confirmed by the Central Diseases Investigation Laboratory in Dhaka.

Some 1, 137 chickens were executed around 10pm on Friday, when 205 eggs were also destroyed.

Apart from this, in the last two days, over 13,000 chickens were executed in the district.

The official said the district livestock department on Friday sent a sample tissue of a dead chicken to the laboratory for tests after some of the chickens of Bushra Poultry Farm in Taratpara area died on Thursday.

A direction was immediately passed to the Upazila livestock department to cull the infected chickens in a bid to stop the infection spread in the surrounding areas.

In Noakhali, about 600 chickens out of over 6,500 of a poultry farm named Shikha Agro Complex of Manikpur village under Sirajpur union died over the last few days.

The local livestock department directed the farm owner to bury the dead chickens and it banned shifting the chickens and eggs of the farm to another place.

Upazila livestock officer Abul Kalam told bdnews24.com that they were confirmed of the infection following the analysis of the tissue at the district laboratory and the regional diseases investigation laboratory in Feni.

"We are waiting for directives from higher authorities to cull the infected chickens," he added.