In the wake of chicken deaths on farms in Changhua, Chiayi and Tainan counties, agriculture officials yesterday urged chicken farmers to stay calm and cooperate with authorities over the weeks ahead.
But some farmers in southern Taiwan have been dumping dead chickens.
PHOTO: CHEN CHING-MIN, TAIPEI TIMES
Yesterday, sanitation workers were reported to be pulling hundreds of dead chickens from Chiangchun River in Tainan County.
In response to the reports, Tainan County Councilor Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) urged the central government to implement stricter procedures for the handling of chickens raised on disease-affected farms.
Earlier this month, 55,000 chickens on two farms in Changhua and Chiayi counties were slaughtered after the discovery of the weaker H5N2 virus.
After analyzing samples collected from both farms, the Animal and Plant Inspection and Quarantine Bureau yesterday released sequencing data which indicated that H5N2 virus samples found at the two sites were virtually identical.
Because the locations of the affected farms are not on known routes for migratory birds, bureau officials said yesterday that smuggled bird-flu vaccines were likely to be involved.
"If illegal vaccines were available here, then smuggling existed," said bureau deputy director general Yeh Ying (葉瑩) at a press conference yesterday.
Yeh said that to further identify the source of the strain, the government needed to acquire vaccines to compare sequencing results.
Yeh said that officials would remain on high alert regarding the approach of migratory birds to protect Taiwan from the more prevalent avian influenza virus, also known as H5N1, which is wreaking havoc in neighboring countries.
Some migratory birds leave Siberia and stop by Japan and the two Koreas before arriving in Taiwan. Others travel along the Chinese coast and Kinmen before arriving in Taiwan.
"Because ducks contaminated by the bird-flu virus were found in Kinmen last month, we will have to pay more attention to migratory birds that pass by there," Yeh said.
According to the Council of Agriculture's Animal Health Research Institute, the H5N2 virus found on the two farms was quite similar to that originally identified in Mexico in 1994. But experts at the institute said that it was almost impossible for the strain to have been carried by migratory birds all the way to Taiwan.
Instead, "the strain might have originated from vaccines containing the active virus," institute director Lin Shih-yu (林士鈺) said.
People who smuggle bird-flu vaccines face three years' imprisonment. Those administering bird-flu vaccines to chickens face a fine between NT$6,000 and NT$18,000.
Other agriculture officials, however, have declined to confirm the connection between smuggled vaccines and the chicken deaths in Taiwan due to lack of evidence.
The bureau has also called for assistance from both the police and investigators in tracking down sources of H5N2.
Farmers at affected farms yesterday also denied the accusation involving illegal vaccines.
Yesterday, the bureau named Happy Shieh (謝快樂), a professor of veterinary medicine at National Chung Hsing University, as its sole delegate to attend a regional emergency summit to be held today in Thailand to discuss the outbreak of bird flu in Asia.
Yeh said that Shieh would inform the international community that the H5N1 virus was not present in Taiwan.
Shieh would also offer other delegations a summary of Taiwan's experience in guarding against bird flu as well as learning of steps taken by other countries, Yeh said.
Also see story:
Bird flu arrives in Laos, nears China
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
HOSPITALITY HIT: Hotels in Hualien have an occupancy rate of 10 percent, down from 30 percent before the earthquake, a Tourism Administration official said The Executive Yuan yesterday unveiled a stimulus package of vouchers and subsidies to revive tourism in Hualien County following a quake measuring 7.2 on the Richter scale. The tremor on April 3, which killed at least 17 people and left two others missing, caused the county an estimated NT$3 billion (US$92.7 million) in damages. The Ministry of Economic Affairs is to issue vouchers worth NT$200 at the price of NT$100 for purchases at the Dongdamen Night Market (東大門夜市) in Hualien City to boost spending, a ministry official told a news conference after a Cabinet meeting in Taipei. The ministry plans to issue 18,400