'African Swine Fever' Kills over 13,000 Pigs in Assam

Guwahati:

The dreaded 'African Swine Fever' has has now killed 13,382 pigs across Assam. To prevent an outbreak, the Government has now also banned the sale and consumption of pork in Kamrup (Metro), Golaghat and Majuli districts in the state.

Announcing this grim development on Twitter, Atul Bora, the Minister for Agriculture and Veterinary said, "Our Task Force is taking all possible preventive measures to protect the pigs from the dreaded disease."

Bora, in an earlier tweet had stated that the "stringent biosafety measures", such as keeping pigs enclosed in sties, have to be adopted in order to curb the spread of the outbreak. "I request piggery owners to abide by Government's guidelines in this regard", Bora said.

It is pertinent to mentioned here that African swine fever virus is a large, double-stranded DNA virus in the Asfarviridae family. It is the causative agent of African swine fever. The virus causes a hemorrhagic fever with high mortality rates in domestic pigs; some isolates can cause death of animals as quickly as a week after infection.

The recent spate of the virus in Assam, the first instances in the country, initially began in Upper Assam with the "mysterious" deaths pof thousands of pigs. The disease is believed to have crossed the border from China to Arunachal Pradesh from where it reportedly reached Assam.

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