Third strain of bird flu found in Taiwan as virus spreads across island’s poultry farms
PUBLISHED : Friday, 16 January, 2015, 4:55pm
UPDATED : Friday, 16 January, 2015, 7:41pm
Lawrence Chung in Taipei
Taiwan health authorities have culled thousands of birds across the island in an effort to stem the spread of bird flu. Photo: AFP
A third avian flu strain has emerged in Taiwan, authorities announced yesterday, in a further blow to local poultry farms that have been forced to cull hundreds of thousands of infected birds since January 8.
The H5N3 virus was detected yesterday at two farms in the island’s south, prompting an immediate cull of 2,720 infected geese, the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine said.
The outbreak is the third avian flu strain, along with H5N2 and H5N8, detected in Taiwan since January 8, the bureau said in a statement.
All three are highly pathogenic avian flu viruses – meaning they are extremely fatal to domestic poultry – and are new to Taiwan. There have been no reports of these viruses being transmitted to humans, the bureau said.
Hsieh Huai-le, honourary professor of the College of Veterinary Medicine at National Chung Hsing University, said the recent outbreak was most likely carriedby migratory birds that stayed for winter in Taiwan in late December.
“The timing is about right as the migratory birds suspected to have carried H5 strains of virus from South Korea to the mainland flocked to Taiwan for winter,” he noted.
South Korea last year reported an avian flu outbreak with virus subtypes similar to the three strains found in Taiwan, the bureau reported.
Unlike the H6N1 virus, that can be transmitted to humans, bureau officials appealed to the public for calm, saying the latest viruses were all eliminated by cooking at temperatures above 70 degrees Celsius.
Taiwan reported the only known case of human infection with H6N1 – a 20-year-old woman in mid-2013, who suffered pneumonia but recovered fully.
The virus was identified when the island was on a high alert for H7N9 avian flu – which does not affect birds but is fatal in about 30 per cent of human cases – after a Taiwanese businessman returning from the mainland was found to have infected with the strain. The H7N9 strain was first detected in humans in eastern China in March, 2013.
