Authorities in China’s Zhejiang province said it will kill 1,332 hogs after an African swine fever outbreak was reported in the city of Yueqing, the city government said in a post on its official Weibo account on Thursday.
Already, authorities have sealed off an area within 3 km (1.8 miles) from the pig farming community where the deadly disease was found, according to the statement. The local government has also banned the movement of animals that can be easily infected inside and outside the affected area, and closed some live hog trading markets and slaughterhouses following the outbreak, the statement said.
The latest cull will bring the total number of pigs deliberately killed to prevent African swine fever to over 25,000 in an effort to control the spread of the highly contagious disease, which was first reported in the city of Shenyang in the northeastern province of Liaoning just three weeks ago.