All 21,500 chickens culled at bird flu-hit farm in Shimane Pref

Thursday 02nd December, 12:29 PM JST

MATSUE —

The Shimane prefectural government said Thursday it has killed all 21,500 chickens and begun incinerating their bodies at a local farm where five birds were confirmed infected with the highly virulent bird flu the previous day. Efforts to disinfect the farm in the city of Yasuki are to be completed by early next week while a government lab in Ibaraki Prefecture is trying to assess the virulence of the H5 virus and the farm ministry is investigating how the birds got infected.

After the disinfection, chickens raised within a 10-kilometer radius from the farm will be checked regularly for at least three weeks, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said. The case in Shimane represents the first bird flu infection since February 2009 when a quail farm in Toyohashi, Aichi Prefecture, was found to be infected by another strain of avian flu virus.