Taiwan Orders Slaughter, Quarantine of Poultry

Health officials ordered the killing of thousands of ducks and chickens in central and southern Taiwan on Thursday to control the latest outbreak of a bird flu that has swept across Asia, devastating poultry stocks and claiming the lives of at least 10 people.

The officials ordered the immediate slaughter of about 27,000 ducks and chickens after the virus was detected among birds at four farms between 20 and 100 miles from the central city of Taichung. A six-month quarantine was also placed on poultry farms within a 2-mile radius of the affected birds.

Thursday’s announcement marked the latest known outbreak of the virus, which was first reported among commercially sold birds last month in South Korea. The disease, which has hit countries in Southeast Asia especially hard, has been detected in 10 nations and territories from Pakistan to Japan.

Some governments have been accused of initially trying to conceal their outbreaks out of concern over huge poultry industry losses, and public health experts believe that exacerbated the problem.

Although the virus mainly attacks wild birds and poultry, it has sometimes jumped to humans who came in contact with infected animals. At least eight people in Vietnam and two in Thailand have died.

The outbreak in Taiwan is said to involve a less virulent strain of the virus, one that has not shown an ability to cross over to humans.

So far, there have been no reports of the more powerful strain, H5N1, being transmitted from person to person. However, officials at the World Health Organization worry that if the strain develops that ability, the results will be extremely serious, as there is no suitable vaccine for humans.

Elsewhere Thursday, governments in the region took steps to stop the spread of the disease. China, which reported the presence of the disease in poultry this week, began destroying 130,000 chickens and ducks, and Indonesian authorities bowed to pressure from the WHO and ordered the immediate culling of infected birds, estimated to number in the millions.

The Indonesian government had initially hoped to contain its outbreak by vaccinating healthy poultry, a move it said it believed stood a better chance of preserving the livelihoods of farmers. Welfare Minister Yusuf Kalla pledged aid for small farmers whose fowl were killed, Associated Press reported.

In Hong Kong -- where a system is in place to detect any return of the pneumonia-like SARS illness -- a 75-year-old woman was isolated and placed under observation after returning from Vietnam with flu-like symptoms. Authorities said she tested negative for the avian flu but that results were not in on severe acute respiratory syndrome, Associated Press said.

At a news conference today, Hong Kong Health Secretary E. K. Yeoh announced a temporary ban on importing live chickens and the closure of a large bird sanctuary near the frontier with mainland China.

Yeoh said an import ban “for the time being” was needed to clear a backlog of unsold poultry that had built up in the region because many consumers had stopped buying chickens. He said the stockpile was viewed as an ideal breeding ground for the avian virus.

The Mai Po sanctuary is a prime resting spot for migratory birds traveling between Siberia and equatorial Asia.

As the struggle to contain bird flu continued, Chinese government spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue dismissed as groundless a report in the current issue of the British magazine New Scientist suggesting that the disease might have been transmitted across a wide area of Asia by birds from southern China that were inoculated with a vaccine not properly matched to H5N1.

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Times staff writer Marshall reported from Hong Kong and special correspondent Tsai from Taipei.