By Bob Burgdorfer CHICAGO, Feb 5 (Reuters) - Stocks in the largest U.S. chicken companies were lower on Monday after the deadly bird flu hit a turkey farm in England, but U.S. chicken experts said there is no immediate danger to the $38.5 billion U.S. chicken industry. "It has to be a knee-jerk reaction to the bird flu," Paul Aho, economist at Poultry Perspective, of the drop in stocks for Tyson Foods Inc. <TSN.N>, Pilgrim's Pride Corp. <PPC.N> , and Sanderson Farms Inc <SAFM.O>. "I don't think we should be any more worried about this than we were before," he said. However, the National Chicken Council expressed concern that the turkeys were infected despite being confined to barns. Commercially raised U.S. chickens and turkeys are also kept in barns, which had been seen as a safeguard against the flu. "We will be interested to hear the results of the investigation on how it got in there," said Richard Lobb, spokesman for the National Chicken Council. "At this point, there is no reason to think we have any higher risk than we had before," Lobb said of the U.S. chicken industry. The H5N1 avian flu virus has killed 165 people in 10 countries -- Turkey, Azerbaijan, Egypt, Iraq, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, China, Nigeria and Cambodia. It has infected 271, giving it a more than 50 percent fatality rate, but experts are unsure if some people may have had less serious infections that went undetected. In response to outbreaks overseas, the United States has tightened biosecurity at poultry farms and increased surveillance of migratory birds to keep the flu out. Previous outbreaks have hurt U.S. chicken exports as consumers overseas shun the bird. A case of the deadly flu in a commercial flock would cause the flock to be destroyed and possibly surrounding flocks as well. Also, overseas buyers would likely ban chicken from the infected area.Exports are important to the U.S. chicken industry, which sells about 15 percent of its production overseas. In 2006, chicken sales reached $38.5 billion. Near midday on Monday, shares of Tyson Foods, the nation's largest meat producer, were down 9 cents at $18.03 per share; shares of Pilgrim's Pride, the largest U.S. chicken producer, were down 85 cents at $31.21; and shares of Sanderson Farms were down $1.84 at $30.44.
