China to ban imports of pigs from Cambodia due to African swine fever
29 Apr 2019 04:35PM
BEIJING: China will ban imports of pigs, wild boars and related products from Cambodia, its customs said on Monday, after the Southeast nation reported its first case of the highly-contagious disease.

That comes as China is already battling the virus after it spread to every province and region on its mainland since first being detected there in early August.

Cambodia reported its first outbreak of African swine fever in backyard pigs in early April.
Source: Reuters

It seems that the most likely means of the ASF disease transmission is through feeding infected pork meat to pigs. The virus, which does not affect humans, remains present in the meat after it is processed and will infect pigs who eat it. It seems that feeding pigs with pork is common practice in the region.

April 30, 2019
More pigs killed due to ASF in Ratanakkiri
Agriculture department officials in Ratanakkiri province yesterday said more than 700 pigs in O’Chum district had died or were culled due to an outbreak of African Swine Fever.

The disease, which first struck hundreds of pigs in the province’s O’Yadav district in late March, spread to O’Chum district during the Khmer New Year period.

Soy Sona, provincial agriculture department director, yesterday said that authorities found that some pigs among more than 700 of the animals in O’Chum district had died from ASF, requiring all the others to be culled to prevent the disease from spreading.

“Our officials are monitoring the situation because there are no visible symptom of ASF and the disease can only be detected if sickened animals die,” he said.

Mr Sona noted that despite a ban on the movement of pigs or pork in the province, some people are still transporting pork or pork products to sell in other villages, some of which is used for feeding pigs.

“Because of the extremely hot weather, the pigs find it difficult to forage for food in the area, leading villagers to buy pork products to feed their animals,” he said. “We suspect that the animals fell sick after eating pork derived from infected animals.”
https://www.khmertimeskh.com/50599141/m ... nakkiri-2/

THE FACTS:
African swine fever is a viral disease impacting only pigs, not people — so it is not a public health threat nor a food-safety concern.

ASF cannot be transmitted to humans through contact with pigs or pork.
ASF only affects members of the pig family.
ASF can be transmitted to pigs through feeding of food waste containing contaminated pork products.
ASF is transmitted to pigs through direct contact with infected pigs, their waste, blood, contaminated clothing, feed, equipment and vehicles, and in some cases, some tick species.
https://www.pork.org/production/animal- ... resources/

African swine fever has killed a million pigs—and isn’t slowing down
The science behind the world’s deadliest swine disease.
By
Popular Science -
May 2, 2019

When a herd of pigs in Cambodia’s Rattanakiri province crammed into a huddle, their pink ears tinged purple, it was too late. On March 22, the National Animal Health and Production Research Institute in Phnom Penh recognized the herd’s ailment as the country’s first confirmed cases of African swine fever. Within days, 400 animals fell to the contagion, hemorrhages corroding their organs. According to a report from Cambodia’s Ministry of Agriculture, the remaining 100 were killed.

In full: https://www.popsci.com/african-swine-fever-science

Svay Rieng: Following a tip-off, on the evening of May 8, 2019, at around 11m, a truck carrying 30 live pigs was stopped and inspected by the Svay Rieng police force. The load of pigs was being brought into the country illegally from Vietnam and the animals will be destroyed in accordance with quarantine laws to stem the outbreak of Asian Swine Fever.

The truck driver was taken into custody for questioning by police.

Hong Kong culls 6,000 pigs after African swine fever found
Incurable virus detected in a pig imported from Guangdong province in mainland China
Sat 11 May 2019 04.58 BST
Hong Kong will cull 6,000 pigs after its first ever case of African swine fever was found in an animal at a slaughterhouse close to the border with mainland China.

Sophia Chan, Hong Kong’s secretary for food and health, said the incurable virus was found in a pig imported from a farm in Guangdong province on the mainland where an outbreak has devastated herds.

Pork is China’s staple meat and its price and availability is considered a matter of national concern. Shortfalls in supply have increased demand for pork from producers in the US, with whom China is locked in a tariff battle.

Unlike swine flu, African swine fever cannot be transmitted to humans and Chan said well-cooked pork remained safe for consumption.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/ ... ever-found

Cambodia News: Cambodia police and customs officers continue to stop and search vehicles coming from Vietnam in case they are carrying illegal pigs. All trans-border traffic of pigs has been forbidden following the recent outbreak of African Swine Fever.
On the morning of May 15, 2019, at the point of Andong Svay village, Vihear Thom commune, Kampong Siem district, a minivan was stopped carrying 17 live pigs coming from Vietnam to Tbong Khmum.

'No way to stop it': millions of pigs culled across Asia as swine fever spreads
Experts say region is losing the battle to stop the biggest animal disease outbreak the planet has ever faced
Hannah Ellis-Petersen in Bangkok
Thu 6 Jun 2019 01.59 BST
South-east Asia is battling to contain the spread of highly contagious African swine fever, known as “pig Ebola”, which has already led to the culling of millions of pigs in China and Vietnam.

African swine fever, which is harmless to humans but fatal to pigs, was discovered in China in August, where it has caused havoc, leading to more than 1.2m pigs being culled. China is home to almost half of the world’s pigs and the news sent the global price of pork soaring.

There is no vaccination for African swine fever, which causes pigs to internally haemorrhage until they die, so the only option to contain the disease is to kill any contaminated animals. Some estimates say that in China up to 200m animals may eventually be slaughtered. The virus can last for several weeks on anything from clothes to vehicles, allowing for it to easily travel long distances.

It has spread like wildfire across Asia, causing growing devastation to the pig farmers of Vietnam and Cambodia and putting Thailand, Asia’s second-biggest pork producer, on “red alert”. Cases have increased in Mongolia, North Korea and Hong Kong in recent weeks, while South Korea is blood testing pigs at the border.

The UN Food and Agriculture organisation (UNFAO) and regional experts fear that Myanmar, Philippines and Laos will be next because they are all highly susceptible to an outbreak, due to the struggle to control the movement of pigs and pig products across porous borders.

“This is the biggest animal disease outbreak we’ve ever had on the planet,” said Dirk Pfeiffer, a veterinary epidemiologist at City University of Hong Kong and expert on African swine fever. “It makes the foot and mouth disease and BSE outbreaks pale in comparison to the damage that is being done. And we have no way to stop it from spreading.”

Currently the battle to contain the disease is being lost. “There are concerns that the disease will continue to spread across the countries in south-east Asia,” said Dr Wantanee Kalpravidh, regional manager for UNFAO, who said they believed the swine fever cases being reported by governments in the region were “underestimates”.

Wantanee said problems included the lack of compensation for pig farmers in south-east Asia whose herds were culled, giving them little reason to report a disease outbreak, and fears that banning movement of pigs and pork across borders would only create a “black market which would be impossible to control”.

The implications of the outbreak are already being felt beyond Asia. Global pork prices have risen by almost 40%, and long term it is likely to lead to more pork imports from Europe and America to meet demand, which will also push up global meat prices. Market analyst Rabobank said global pork supplies could fall by 8%.

In Vietnam, the first swine fever case was detected in January this year in northern Vietnam, not far from the border with China. Last week, agriculture minister Nguyen Xuan Cuong confirmed the virus had now spread to 48 of the country’s 63 provinces. The country has now culled about 2m pigs, or 6% of the country’s herd, a figure that is expected to rise steeply.

In Cambodia, around 2400 pigs have died or been culled due to the disease in the past two months, while in Hong Kong two separate cases led to there being no fresh pork in the country for a week.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/ ... -thailand-

A Nasty Swine Flu in China Means Big Trouble for US Farmers
Not for the reason you think.
By Mother Jones -
June 16, 2019

A relentlessly rainy spring and President Donald Trump’s trade war with Chinaaren’t the only forces haunting the Midwest’s corn and soybean farmers. A deadly, highly contagious disease called African swine fever—thankfully, harmless to humans—is sweeping through China’s hog farms, literally killing demand for feed.

African swine fever has already wiped out at least 20 percent of the nation’s hog herd this year, according to the Dutch agricultural lender Rabobank. That amounts to about 90 million pigs—more than the entire US hog population, the globe’s second-largest behind China. That’s bad news for American farmers, because China imports large quantities of our soybeans. China houses nearly 60 percent of the entire globe’s pig herd—and fattening nearly half a billion pigs for slaughter every year requires it to import two-thirds of all globally traded soybeans.

In full: https://www.motherjones.com/food/2019/0 ... s-farmers/

Swine fever is spreading thanks to sausage smuggling say Japanese authorities.

African swine flu poses a new challenge in Asia
June 29, 2019
Travelers to Japan, or residents returning to Japan from trips abroad, are warned that they should not bring overseas food products into the country. Those warnings usually fall on deaf ears: How dangerous can sausage or fruit be?

Very, as is now evident from the appearance of the African swine flu (ASF) virus in Japan. Scientists have traced the living ASF virus to undercooked pork sausage products brought into the country from China. This is the first time that ASF virus has been found in a contagious state in Japan, though no ASF outbreak has been confirmed. The Japanese government must step up measures to prevent illegal meat products from entering the country. That effort will only succeed if Japanese citizens take the warnings seriously. Tokyo must also work with Asian governments to fight outbreaks throughout the region.

Found throughout Africa, ASF was first discovered in the nation of Georgia in 2007 and then spread to Russia. It is thought that ASF entered China through imported pork products. It was first reported in northeast China in August 2018. As is often the case with a disease that is highly contagious, it quickly spread throughout the country and, ignoring borders, has now been found in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Mongolia, Hong Kong and possibly North Korea. Experts believe an outbreak in Myanmar is only a matter of time.
https://asianchronicler.com/african-swi ... e-in-asia/