New measures implemented to bring bird flu under control
cctv.com 02-05-2004 13:25
China's Ministry of Agriculture has confirmed an outbreak of the H5N1 strain of bird flu in Chenggong County, Yunnan Province. The ministry has also announced two more areas with suspected outbreaks, one in Yunnan's capital, Kunming, and the other in Gaolan County in Gansu Province.
In these and many other infected Chinese provinces and regions, quarantine authorities are implementing various effective measures, as well as enforcing around-the-clock vaccinations for all poultry farms in the vicinity of problem areas. Quarantine and vaccination are believed to be the most effective means to curb the spread of the highly contagious bird flu.
Vaccine dispatched from Beijing arrived at Urumqi airport at nearly midnight on Wednesday. And quarantine departments in Xinjiang quickly started a relay-transfer of the eagerly anticipated remedy to the disease. Vehicles waiting at checkpoints of every affected area are responsible for distributing the allotted vaccine to every poultry farm. In the worst hit area, the No. 12 Farming Division of Xinjiang Production and Construction Corp, every fowl within a five-kilometer radius from the affected farm has been vaccinated. And every vehicle-crossing checkpoint outside the problem area is required to be disinfected, inspected and registered to prevent poultry products from being transported out.
In Pingjiang County in central China's Hunan Province, where only suspected cases of bird flu have been reported, a thorough vaccination has been enforced on all fowls within a five-kilometer radius from the affected area. Quarantine experts visit every poultry raiser in the area and provide free vaccination for all of them. All of these measures are helping to boost the confidence of villagers in affected areas. Stricter vaccination has also been carried out in nearby Wugang City, where bird flu cases have been confirmed. So far, more than 80 percent of the fowls in the city have been vaccinated.
Editor:Zheng Source:CCTV.com
