BACOLOD City – The Provincial Veterinary Office (PVO) of Negros Occidental assured its poultry raisers that safety precautions are in place to prevent the entry of bird flu in the province.
Provincial veterinarian Dr. Renate Decena said on March 16 that Negros Occidental has a lesser chance of being contaminated of the virus since it does not source poultry products from the identified affected area in Luzon.
“We have surplus in supply of poultry products, including chicken, so
there’s no movement of such commodities from the affected place going to the
province,” Decena said.
Negros Occidental already established guidelines on how to safeguard its P7 billion
local poultry industry.
Necessary measures on preventing the entry of avian influenza are being implemented like regulating the movement of poultry products, he added.
“However, to further ensure the safety of our poultry industry, gamefowl raisers must avoid going to Luzon, particularly in Nueva Ecija,” Decena stressed.
The Department of Agriculture (DA) confirmed that the avian influenza, under the highly pathogenic strain H5N6, infected a village in Nueva Ecija.
A total of 12,000 quails from a farm in Jaen, Nueva Ecija have been culled and buried on March 14.
According to the DA, there’s a slim chance that the virus can be transmitted to humans, adding that H5N6 is a virus far less deadly than H5N1.
Secretary of Agriculture William Dar, for his part, said that quarantine protocols have been in place in the affected area with a one-kilometer radius, which is designated as a quarantine zone. Some seven kilometers beyond that, meanwhile, will be considered as a surveillance zone.
In 2017, the bird flu also struck farms in San Luis, Pampanga and the towns of Jaen and San Isidro in Nueva Ecija.
As part of these preventive measures, the PVO, along with the Bureau of Animal Industry, are set to conduct sample testing among birds in identified migratory sites in this province.(With a report from PNA/PN)
