January 9, 2007

Ducks die en masse in Vietnam's Soc Trang province

Thousands of ducks in Vietnam's southern Soc Trang province have died in the recent days, reports the Vietnam News Agency.

Some 4,000 ducks in two farms in the province's Nga Nam and Thanh Tri districts have been either killed by an identified disease or culled by local relevant agencies. Specimens from the affected waterfowls are being tested for the H5N1 virus.

The government has asked sectors and localities nationwide to focus their anti-disease activities on surveillance, detoxification, vaccination, quarantine, and control over transport and trade of poultry and related products.

Bird flu since December 2006 has hit 33 communities in 15 districts in the three southern provinces of Ca Mau, Bac Lieu and Hau Giang, according to the Department of Animal Health under the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.  It has killed some 6,000 poultry, and led to the forced culling of nearly 23,000 others, mainly ducks and chickens.

Since it first hit Vietnam in 2003, bird flu have killed and led to the forced culling of dozens of millions of fowls in the country.