April 28, 2006

Thousands of cattle in Vietnam stricken by foot-and-mouth disease

Foot-and-mouth disease has spread to 4,000 livestock, killing 1,500 of them in Vietnam's central Lam Dong province, a local newspaper reported Thursday (Apr 28).

The disease has recently hit the animals in six out of 12 districts and towns in the province.

The province on Apr 19 declared the outbreak in Duc Trong after samples from pigs tested positive to the type O foot-and-mouth virus. By that time, over 2,250 pigs and bulls in the Duc Trong district had been infected with the disease, some 800 of them died.

There are 669 poultry and cattle trading bases in Lam Dong, the vast majority of them unlicensed. Vietnam has banned trade and transport of cattle from Duc Trong to other areas.