KEY POINTS:
An outbreak of bird flu in Britain last week does not pose a threat to New Zealand, but the arrival of the virus here is inevitable, the Health Ministry says.
More than 50,000 turkeys on a farm in Suffolk were gassed during the weekend and 100,000 more will be slaughtered after birds tested positive for the H5N1 virus.
The national co-ordinator of pandemic planning, Steve Brazier, said pandemic planning had been under way for the past 18 months and New Zealand would be ready "when the big one hits".
The Government had stockpiles of masks, antibiotics and Tamiflu, a drug thought to lessen some of the effects of the disease.
