A new outbreak of African swine fever (ASF) was found in Nyingchi city in Southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region and Urumqi city in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, which shows that the disease has spread across the Chinese mainland except South China's Hainan Province.
China's Ministry of Agricultureand Rural Affairs announced on Sunday that the disease had been detected in several counties in Nyingchi, where 55 pigs died.
The ministry immediately sent a supervision group to Nyingchi. Local authorities had launched an emergency response mechanism by culling and disposing of affected pigs, and quarantined and decontaminated the affected areas. Authorities also banned all live pigs and pork products from getting in or out of the affected areas.
The ministry announced Thursday that the epidemic surfaced in Urumqi city, Northwest China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
An employee surnamed Ma of a livestock slaughtering company in Nagqu in Tibet, a county neighboring Nyingchi told the Global Times on Monday that their pig farms had been closed since December 2018 after an ASF outbreak in China. He said they have received no official notice on when they can reopen.
According to the China Animal Disease Control Center report, the epidemic broke out in Midong district in Urumqi, Southwest China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, the ministry said on Wednesday. Fifteen pigs were affected while 15 died from 200 pigs raised in the affected farm.
The outbreak has spread to 30 mainland provincial-level regions except Hainan since China reported its first case of the disease in August 2018 in Liaoning Province, media reported.
