All cattle in the nation are to be vaccinated against lumpy skin disease by next week, the Council of Agriculture (COA) said on Monday.
Eight beef cattle infected with the disease were discovered on a farm in New Taipei City’s Linkou District (林口) on Thursday — a first for Taiwan proper.
Council minister Chen Chi-chung (陳吉仲) at the time said that the disease likely spread from Kinmen County or China.
Photo: Tsai Tsung-hsun, Taipei Times
To prevent further transmission, the council began vaccinating all cattle in Taiwan, and as of Sunday, all cattle raised in areas north of Miaoli County had been inoculated, council Deputy Minister Huang Chin-cheng (黃金城) said on Monday.
Vaccinations in Taichung and Changhua County were to begin yesterday, he said.
About 180,000 vaccine doses are to arrive tomorrow, which would allow all cattle in the nation, including those on the outlying islands, to be vaccinated against the disease by next week, Huang said, expressing confidence that the outbreak can be contained.
An inspection conducted in the past few days of 160,815 cattle at 1,623 farms showed them to be in good health, the council said in a statement on Sunday.
The annual output value of the nation’s beef and dairy cattle industry is about NT$14 billion (US$497.5 million), the council said.
Lumpy skin disease is a viral disease that affects cattle and buffalo.
It is spread by flies and mosquitoes, and infected animals develop a fever and nodules on their skin. It can be fatal.
It was detected for the first time in Taiwan in the island county of Kinmen in July last year, which led to the vaccination of all of the roughly 6,200 cattle there.
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