Korea culls 13.6 million poultry as avian influenza cases soar

Health workers in protective suits cull ducks after the H5N8 bird flu strain was detected, in Karuvatta of Alapuzha district some 90 kilometers from Kochi, India, Wednesday. AFP-Yonhap

The agriculture ministry said Wednesday it has completed culling 13.6 million poultry as a preventive measure against the rising number of highly pathogenic avian influenza cases at local farms.

Under the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs' quarantine guidelines, all birds within a 3-kilometer radius of infected farms should be culled. They included 10.8 million chickens.

The ministry confirmed an outbreak of the highly contagious H5N8 strain of bird flu at a duck farm in Eumseong, 131 kilometers south of Seoul.

It has so far found 47 cases of the bird flu strain on local farms since late November.

The government said it has issued a seven-day standstill order for all poultry farms in the county on top of culling the birds.

Of the total reported cases at farms so far, Gyeonggi Province, surrounding Seoul, has accounted for 12, trailed by South Jeolla Province with 10. The number of cases reported among wild birds, meanwhile, has reached 58. (Yonhap)

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