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| Southeast Asia |
| Vietnam reports new bird flu outbreak |
| 2004-10-16 |
| A new bird flu outbreak has surfaced in southern Vietnam, raising renewed fears over the disease that has killed 31 people in Asia this year, officials said on Saturday. Authorities in the southern province of Long An have culled more than 2,300 chickens after about 250 birds from two farms in a village there died from the disease on Sept 30, said Mr Nguyen Duy Long, head of the province's animal health bureau. The entire village has been disinfected and the provincial government has banned the sale and transportation of poultry to or from the affected district for 30 days to try to prevent the virus from spreading, he said. No additional outbreaks have been reported since then, he said. Long An, about 60km south-east of Ho Chi Minh City, was one of the worst-hit provinces in earlier bird flu outbreaks. Saturday's Tien Phong (Pioneer) newspaper reported that police on Wednesday in the northern province of Lan Son had seized 3.5 tonnes of chickens smuggled in from neighbouring China. The birds were later destroyed, the report said. Bird flu has killed or forced the cull of more than 43 million poultry in Vietnam. It has also jumped to humans, killing 20 here and 11 in Thailand. |
| Posted by:Mark Espinola |