Major Chinese cities on high alert of bird flu
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2005-10-25 20:53

The recent H5N1 bird flu outbreak in Liangying Village of east China's Anhui Province has been brought under control.

A total of 550 poultry died in the outbreak.

Experts from the Ministry of Agriculture have been sent to help disease control in the village. So far, the affected area has been sterilized. No human infections or no new poultry bird flu deaths were reported in the province.

The provincial animal disease control center has taken a series of measures to demand mandatory immunity in all poultry farms.

Major Chinese cities are straining every nerve against a possible bird flu pandemic outbreak. All epidemic monitoring networks and pre-schemes for emergency have been activated.

On Tuesday, Beijing launched a thorough surveillance on poultry and bird markets. According to an emergency bird flu prevention order promulgated by the Municipal Industry and Commerce Bureau, all live poultry on sale in Beijing should have origin certificates from bird flu-free regions and quarantine certificates.

The Beijing Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau has setup sterilization stations in 27 highway and road entrances to the Chinese capital, making quarantine inspections on trucks for transporting poultry. Animal quarantine at airports, railway stations have also been enhanced.

Lei Decai, director of the Municipal Agricultural Bureau, said his bureau has seen to bird flu immunity on 98 percent of poultry in stock and 80 percent of birds in zoos, safari parks and bird markets.

The municipal forestry authority has set up 57 monitoring stations checking activities of migratory birds inhabiting wetlands, reservoirs and parks.

In west China's biggest city of Chongqing, all the 101 local checkpoints are working round-the-clock to conduct animal quarantine check-up on cargo entering this populous metropolis.

The Veterinary Department of the Municipal Agricultural Bureau said it had reinforced immunity on live poultry in stock and epidemic-control responsibilities of big poultry farms.

Hangzhou City, capital of east China's Zhejiang Province, has designated a number of hospitals to monitor flu patients and asked these hospitals to report suspected flu cases.

In northern China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, where about 2,600 birds died following a recent H5N1 outbreak, medical staffs are closely monitoring human infection cases. So far, no single case of suspicious flu symptom has been reported in the quarantine-isolation area.