African swine fever spreads to one of China's largest pig breeding areas

The Chinese pork industry is struggling to contain the spread of African swine fever, which has now reached the southwestern part of the country, one of its major pork production areas.

Ten of the 16 infected pigs died on a farm in Yibin, Sichuan Province, the Ministry of Agriculture said on Friday. In central Hubei province, 13 other pigs died of the disease Thursday following an outbreak reported last month.

African swine fever has now spread to most of China's pig farming regions and Sichuan is one of the largest.

The first reported case was confirmed in Liaoning Province in August, followed by cases in northeastern Heilongjiang, Inner Mongolia and Hebei. Liaoning remains the most affected province in the country.

Since then, epidemics have been discovered in the south-loving region of pork, especially in Fujian. To date, 18 of China's 31 provinces and regions have been affected by the disease and more than 100,000 pigs have been slaughtered to prevent the virus from spreading.

In Guangdong, Xu Jianxian, who owns 20,000 pigs on his farm in Zhaoqing, said he was doing everything possible to prevent an outbreak.

"I have not heard of any infections in Guangdong Province – I have very good prevention measures in place," Xu said. "I try to avoid letting aliens get into my pig farm, I vaccinate all my pigs and I disinfect the farm twice a week."

The virus is transmitted by ticks and direct contact between animals, as well as contaminated food, feed and people traveling from one place to another. But there is no vaccine or treatment for African swine fever and the mortality rate can reach 100%. It has not yet been known to infect humans.

China reports first case of African swine fever in animal feed

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At the same time, Russia said that the African swine flu epidemic in China was probably transmitted by imports of pork from the European Union, reported the report. Reuters agency.

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An outbreak of suspected African swine fever in a farm would be linked to the largest animal feed manufacturer in China

In Hong Kong, Secretary of Food and Health, Sophia Chan Siu-chee, said on Sunday that the authorities were in close contact with their counterparts in the continent to monitor outbreaks. "We are all very concerned," said Chan, adding that cleaning and disinfection of slaughterhouses, farms and other high-risk areas would be intensified.

A spokesman for the city's Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation said imports of breeding pigs from the continent had been suspended when the virus had been detected and reminded local hog farmers to strengthen biosecurity measures.

<p class = "canvas-atom canvas-text Mb (1.0em) Mb (0) – sm Mt (0.8em) – sm" type = "text" content = "Additional report by Naomi Ng"data-reactid =" 55 ">Additional report by Naomi Ng

African swine fever spreads to one of China's largest pig breeding areas, first seen in the South China Morning Post

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