Yen Thanh: African swine fever 'hotspot' communes remove checkpoints, do not manage slaughter
(Baonghean.vn) - Records at two "hotspot" communes of African swine fever in Yen Thanh district show that the work of disease prevention and control here still has many factors that reveal negligence and subjectivity towards the disease.
Pork is still sold in epidemic areas.
On the afternoon of July 25, we returned to Dong Thanh commune (Yen Thanh), the locality ranked second in terms of complexity of African swine fever in Yen Thanh district.
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| Bustling pork trading scene in Vu Ky hamlet, Dong Thanh commune. Photo taken on the afternoon of July 25. Photo: Xuan Hoang |
Strangely, in Vu Ky hamlet, people freely sell pork on Provincial Road 22. They said that the pigs were caught in the hamlet for slaughter and not brought from elsewhere. Meanwhile, in July, in Vu Ky hamlet, there were pigs infected with African swine fever.
People in Dong Thanh commune reported that in recent days, some people have been selling pork in the hamlet near the commune center, but the commune has not checked or handled anything.
Observations show that on the main roads of the commune, as well as the hamlets, there are no epidemic control checkpoints.
At first, the commune implemented drastic epidemic prevention and control solutions, including setting up epidemic control checkpoints. He was one of the forces on duty at the checkpoints, but for many days now, the commune has not assigned him to be on duty at the checkpoints anymore.
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| The checkpoint on the main road of Dong Thanh commune has been removed for many days now. Photo: Xuan Hoang |
Mr. Thai Van Thanh - Chairman of Dong Thanh Commune People's Committee said that the commune will send police to check daily for people slaughtering pigs for sale. Previously, the commune had announced and propagated on loudspeakers, prohibiting people from slaughtering pigs during the time when the commune is having an epidemic.
Regarding the issue of inactive epidemic control checkpoints, Mr. Thanh said that because the epidemic has lasted for a long time in the commune, it is impossible to maintain the quarantine checkpoints because of the force and funding involved.
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| Observations in the hamlets with the epidemic in Dong Thanh commune show that there is almost no lime powder sprinkled in front of the gates of households raising pigs, as well as on the roads. In the photo, Mr. Phan Dang Ha's family in Dong Hoa hamlet had 62 pigs destroyed due to the epidemic, but there was no lime powder sprinkled in front of the gate. Photo: Xuan Hoang |
African swine fever has occurred in Dong Thanh commune since May 30. Up to now, 54 households have had infected pigs, with a total of 265 pigs destroyed, with a total weight of more than 11.5 tons.
Commune with 131 epidemic points still removes control posts
Nhan Thanh commune is the locality with the strongest outbreak of African swine fever in Yen Thanh district, with 131 outbreak points. However, surprisingly, on the main roads of the commune as well as the hamlets, there are no active quarantine checkpoints, if any, there are only traces of lime powder and straw... of the quarantine checkpoints that were dismantled a long time ago.
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| The epidemic control checkpoint of Nhan Thanh commune was also removed while the epidemic is complicated in this locality. Photo: Xuan Hoang |
People complained that they did not know why the commune had removed all the disease control checkpoints, while the disease was spreading rapidly, with new outbreaks occurring almost every day, threatening to wipe out the commune's pig herd.
The entire hamlet has 27 households raising pigs, mainly sows, but by July 25, 16 households had to destroy the pigs infected with the disease. Since the outbreak, the hamlet has only received 1.5 liters of chemicals and some bags of lime powder, which are too little to distribute to households for spraying.
Ms. Phan Thi Van - an agricultural official of Nhan Thanh commune said: From the end of June until now, the locality has destroyed pigs infected with the disease almost every day. The locality has 16 hamlets, of which 11 hamlets have had African swine fever, with 131 households raising infected pigs, 542 pigs have been destroyed, with a total weight of more than 16 tons.
On June 20, the first outbreak occurred in Nhan Thanh commune. After more than a month, the outbreak has become increasingly severe, with an average of 4 households infected per day. With the complicated situation of the epidemic in Nhan Thanh commune, there is a risk that the epidemic will continue to spread to many other households.
According to Ms. Van, the cause of the outbreak of African swine fever in the commune is due to the high density of livestock farming in households, along with the high temperature in recent months, which affects the health of pigs and weakens their resistance.
It is known that when the epidemic first broke out, Nhan Thanh established 4 quarantine checkpoints, but by July 25, none of them were still operating.
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| People in Nhan Thanh commune are worried that African swine fever will wipe out their pig herd. Photo: Xuan Hoang |
As of July 25, the commune had only received 40 liters of chemicals and 2 tons of lime powder from the district. Therefore, the whole commune had only been able to spray twice, and each hamlet had also received 1-2 liters to distribute to people for self-spraying.
Mr. Nguyen Van Duong - Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Yen Thanh district said: In Yen Thanh area, African swine fever is developing complicatedly in some communes: Nhan Thanh, Dong Thanh, Phuc Thanh, Hau Thanh... in which the two "hottest" communes are Nhan Thanh and Dong Thanh.
In the near future, the district will provide more chemicals to these two localities to deploy simultaneous spraying in the commune, in accordance with the regulations of the veterinary agency. At the same time, it will advise the district People's Committee to strengthen the direction of disease prevention and control in these two localities.
By July 25, Yen Thanh had allocated 2.2 billion VND in reserve funds to buy lime powder, supplies, tools... to support the checkpoints. Of which, 1 billion VND came from the district budget, the remaining 1.2 billion VND came from the localities. However, after 2 months, the epidemic broke out in 31 communes, with a total of 1,889 pigs having to be destroyed, with a total weight of over 93 tons.
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