January 26, 2011

 

South Korea reports two more FMD cases

 

 

South Korea has reported two additional FMD outbreaks in the country regardless of intensive quarantine efforts and wholesale vaccination of livestock, the government said Tuesday (Jan 25).

 

The Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said pig farms in Gimhae and Gongju, 450 kilometres and 160 km south of Seoul, respectively, tested positive for the highly contagious animal disease.

 

The outbreak in Gimhae is the second confirmed case in the province located in the southeastern tip of the country and a clear sign that FMD has spread nationwide. A total of six provinces and two large cities had confirmed cases of the animal disease since the first outbreak was reported on November 29.

 

With the exception of some breeding sows that received vaccines more than two weeks ago, all 8,188 animals will be destroyed at the farms to stop the spread of the disease, the ministry said.

 

No animals at nearby farms, however, will be culled in accordance with updated quarantine rules announced last week that reflect ongoing nationwide vaccination efforts that should be complete by the end of January.

 

Seoul started inoculating a limited number of cattle starting on December 25 and expanded this to all pigs and cows in the country this year after existing quarantine efforts failed to stem the outbreak. Over 2.62 million cows, pigs, goats and deer have been culled and buried at a cost of over KRW2.5 trillion (US$2.2 billion).

 

The country was hit by the disease in 2000, 2002 and two more times early last year.

 

The ministry, meanwhile, confirmed two new bird flu outbreaks late Monday (Jan 24), with one case involving an egg-laying chicken farm in Sangju, North Gyeongsang Province, that had not been affected by the avian disease in the past.

 

All 201,000 chickens at the Sangju farm have been ordered culled along with 8,300 ducks at the farm in Icheon, southeast of the capital city.

 

Counting the new cases, the country has reported 37 outbreaks since the first was confirmed on December 31 with 5.15 million birds culled so far.

 

South Korea has been hit by avian influenza three times before. Prior to the recent cases, the last outbreak occurred in April 2008 and resulted in a record 8.46 million birds being culled at a cost of around KRW264 billion (US$235.3 Million). Other previous outbreaks took place in the winter months of 2003-2004 and 2006-2007.