A meeting will be convened next week to discuss whether to vaccinate the rest of the country’s goats to contain the spread of the goat pox virus (GPV) after the number of goats culled because of fears of the disease passed 10,000 as of Thursday, a Council of Agriculture official said yesterday.
Huang Kuo-ching (黃國青), deputy director of the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine, said the number of goats culled this year had reached more than 11,000 in 10 cities and counties — Chiayi and Tainan cities and Taipei, Taoyuan, Taichung, Changhua, Yunlin, Chiayi, Tainan and Kaohsiung counties.
The infections first caused concern in April after nearly 800 goats were culled at two farms in Yunlin County’s Siluo Township (西螺).
“As the goat pox outbreak has yet to reach a peak, the bureau will convene a meeting next week to discuss ways to control the disease,” Huang said.
The bureau will also conduct an overall investigation of nearly 3,000 goat farms to determine if there have been other outbreaks that have not been reported, and to discuss measures with farmers, he said, adding that the findings would be submitted to experts who would decide if vaccinations are needed to control the disease.
He said the bureau purchased 50,000 doses of vaccine on June 1 and will buy 180,000 more in two weeks. If a vaccination program is needed, the supplies will be sufficient to treat 220,000 animals.
This is the second time the disease has been reported in Taiwan.
The first outbreak was in July 2008 in Taoyuan County, and is believed to have been related to animal smuggling from GPV-affected areas, which include Vietnam, China, Mongolia, Africa and the Middle East, although the exact source has never been confirmed.
GPV is characterized by fever accompanied with ocular and nasal discharges, as well as lesions on the skin and mucous membrane of the nostrils, mouth and vulva. Mortality rates can be high. Most kids and lambs with the disease tend to die and the death rate among adult animals is about 50 percent.
GPV cannot infect humans and can be destroyed by exposure to high temperatures.
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