Taiwan reports bird flu outbreaks at six more farms

Taiwan has reported six fresh outbreaks of a less virulent form of the bird flu that has killed 22 people across Asia.

Taiwan has reported six fresh outbreaks of a less virulent form of the bird flu that has killed 22 people across Asia. The Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine (BAPHIQ) ordered a cull of 113,500 chickens at six farms after the H5N2 virus was found in dead fowl. Five farms in central Taiwan’s Changhua county were ordered to slaughter 82,500 birds while 31,000 would be culled at a farm in the southern county of Kaohsiung to avoid the spread of the virus, deputy director Yeh Ying said in a statement. Taiwan has killed 354,000 chickens and ducks and some 300 rare birds at 18 farms since the first H5N2 case was reported on January 15 at a chicken farm in Changhua. The origin of the infection remains unknown but the bureau said it suspected the virus could have been spread by migratory birds or vehicles moving from one farm to another. The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, which has killed 22 people in Vietnam and Thailand and led to the cull of some 80 million chickens, has not been detected in Taiwan.(Source: ABC News, Feb 2004)