Voa Agriculture Report - China Sees Control of Pig Disease

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is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report.

The government China says much progress has been made in efforts control the spread of blue-ear pig disease. Government officials last week that forty-seven thousand pigs were infected in . That was down more than fifty percent from the reported for June.

The name for the virus comes the fact that infected pigs can temporarily develop discolored . The scientific name is porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome.

China has an estimated five hundred million pigs. An Ministry spokesman said more than one hundred million pigs been given vaccine to prevent the disease.

The said two hundred fifty-seven thousand pigs were infected with virus this year. Sixty-eight thousand of them died. Many were destroyed.

An Agriculture Ministry official said the outbreak a form of the virus that is unusually deadly pigs.

Vietnam also has reported recent cases of blue-ear .

The disease causes reproductive failure in female pigs and difficulties in young pigs. Older pigs may also be . Signs of the disease can include high fever and of pneumonia. Pigs weakened by the virus are more to get bacterial infections.

An outbreak of infectious disease as many as one million pigs in China last . China's top veterinary health official said this past June blue-ear disease was the cause of most of those . China reported the outbreak to the World Organization for Health last September.

The World Organization for Animal Health the disease happens in most major pig-producing areas of world. The disease was first recognized in nineteen eighty-seven the United States. Three years later it appeared in Europe and spread quickly.

The agency says the does not seem to affect animals other than pigs. say they do not know of any cases of who have gotten the pig disease.

China is the largest producer of pigs. Supply shortages have driven up prices this year in China. Still, a Commerce Ministry said this month that China exported sixty-two thousand metric of pork in the first half of the year. compared with pork exports of two hundred forty-six tons all of last year.

And that's the VOA Special Agriculture Report, written by Jerilyn Watson. For more stories agriculture, go to voaspecialenglishcom.. I'm Faith Lapidus.

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