SIR - The Chief Medical Officer predicts that 50,000 Britons will die of bird flu. Grim stuff for a disease that, at present anyway, cannot be transmitted from person-to-person, and can only be caught from infected birds.

However, would you not think that it would have made sense to stop all imports of birds into this country weeks ago? The Government appears at last to have cottoned on to this, but the problem, as always where trade is concerned, is our membership of the European Union.

As with the recent case of ladies' underwear from China, our hands are tied. This trade in birds raises serious welfare issues, but, even when the health of the nation is supposedly at risk, we are powerless to stop it.

RICHARD CHAMINGS,

UK Independence Party,

Malvern.