Epidemic Is Killing Pigs in Southeastern China

[Zenlitened]

Source: The New York Times

Epidemic Is Killing Pigs in Southeastern China

By KEITH BRADSHER
Published: May 7, 2007

HONG KONG, May 7 — A mysterious epidemic is killing pigs in southeastern China, but international and Hong Kong authorities said today that the Chinese government is providing little information about it, or about the contaminated wheat gluten that has caused deaths and illnesses in other animals.

The lack of even basic details is reviving longstanding questions about whether China is willing to share information about health and food safety issues with potential global implications.

(snip)

Hong Kong television broadcasts and newspapers were full of lurid accounts today of pigs staggering around with blood pouring from their bodies in Gaoyao and neighboring Yunfu, both in Guangdong Province. The Apple Daily newspaper said that as many as 80 percent of the pigs in the area had died, that panicky farmers were selling ailing animals at deep discounts and that pig carcasses were floating in a river.

The reports in Hong Kong said the disease began killing pigs after the Chinese New Year celebrations in February, and is now spreading. But state-controlled news outlets in China have reported almost nothing about the pig deaths, and very little about the wheat gluten problem.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/07/world/asia/07cnd-hongkong.html?hp

[jollyreaper2112]

1. brilliant!

Nice to see they're selling the downers. Those crafty bastards have learned capitalism from the worst of us!

[demo dutch]

34. Self delete

[Zenlitened]

52. UPDATE -- See post #51 -- Chinese gov't says it has ID'd the illness

... and is vaccinating healthy animals against the disease.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2837850&mesg_id=2841303

They insist diseased pigs were NOT sold, were grown only for local use, anyway.

Source is China Daily... it would be nice to see some verification from independent health investigators outside China. Outside the meat industry, too, for that matter!

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-05/10/content_869307.htm

[kestrel91316]

2. Not sure what to make of this, but my initial impression is

not good.

A new infectious disease?
Resurgence of an old infectious disease?
Mass poisoning by the Karma Fairy??

[whopis01]

25. It is probably related to GM crops. n/t

[mhatrw]

33. It's most probably their feed. Have you missed the entire pet food crisis? n/t

[spotbird]

26. Bird flu jumped species?

The Avian influenza is hemorrhagic.

[candice]

48. The poor pigs didn't do anything...they are smart animals..

[thecrow]

3. Some kind of hemmorhagic swine flu?

Some of the people who had that bird flu were bleeding too.... could the virus have jumped a species?
If so, watch out if it spreads to people, as in 1918

[roamer65]

4. Yup, the hop is avian-swine-people.

I wonder if avian flu has made the jump.:yoiks:

[ohio2007]

5. No more sweet -n- sour pork or swine flu dumplings

[krkaufman]

7. Exactly my fear. IIRC, piggies are very close to our immune system ...

... so this is a bad sign.

[tavalon]

14. That's the first thing I thought too

I didn't even go to the contaminated gluten if H5N1 has made the jump to pigs, it is one step closer to making all the rest of this crap called politics into just so much background noise.

[candice]

6. Deep discounts!

Not just the ordinary melamine or di-ethyl glycerin poisoning....

[krkaufman]

8. 80% dead... with carcasses floating in a river

For emphasis...

The Apple Daily newspaper said that as many as 80 percent of the pigs in the area had died, that panicky farmers were selling ailing animals at deep discounts and that pig carcasses were floating in a river.

Yikes.

I'm so glad that we've leveraged globalization as a workaround to all the health, safety, environmental and worker protections enacted during the 20th century. What took 100 years to put in place, the Republicans and Corpos have neutered within 30 years.

[bonito]

16. Good point n/t

[Javaman]

22. I'm sure they will grind them up and feed them to the cows...

just like they do here.

[Critters2]

9. Has anyone checked their feed for melamine?

Epidemics in a country with no inspection process. I'm SHOCKED! SHOCKED I tell you!

[tavalon]

15. I hope it's melamine

I really do because if it's what I think it is, this is one step closer to pandemic.

[krkaufman]

10. Definitely time to start looking into local food markets.

With the current FDA there's just no way to trust that you're getting safe food.

[NYC]

11. You're not kidding.

I have fewer food choices all the time.

[krkaufman]

44. Yes. It's a good time for that diet I've been putting off. ; ) n/t

[Olney Blue]

12. I hope they can identify the etiologic agent as fast as possible.

[hedgehog]

13. Imagine whatever this is getting loose in one of our monster

factory farms!

[FrankieBud]

32. I actually didn't need yet another reason to stop eating pork.

But I think this crises in China just assured that in my life, I will no longer eat pork. I wonder that if it did hit one of our factory farms, if the FDA would allow them to still sell the stuff as food. I guess we all know the answer to that.

[tomreedtoon]

17. Pork sale at Wal-Mart!

Although you may wish to pick up a couple of those Chinese lead-lined baby bibs for your little one, if you intend to put your baby in the same basket as the caskets of pork.

[StarryNite]

18. I wouldn't be surprised

if they fed the dead pigs to other pigs or farm animals. This is really escalating and our government needs to quit importing all goods from China until they clean up their act. Actually we need to permanently ban all food imports from China, they have proven they can't be trusted.

[pokercat999]

30. I wouldn't be surprised if they just cut em up and put em

into the regular food system.

[jaksavage]

19. De Ja Wu ?

Didn't I learn from some brilliant poster on this sight that Bush senior(GWB) was in charge of a CIA research facility in Haiti using Monkey brains to culture swine virus, same stuff was going on in angola . haiti had its wild pig population irradicated by the US Natl Guard afterward/during this period. To top it off these spots are identified as the first AIDS clusters. Now the unmanagable bug is loose in the hinterlands of China.

The racists call it population control.
Like drugs only better, it actually kills the victims.

Get up stand up
Stand up for your rights...

[Megahurtz]

36. Gawld.

:puke:

Color me not surprized.

[lovuian]

20. China is just such a Poison and evil regime

its in major trouble ecologically

[Javaman]

21. SE Asia, ground zero for all flu's.

I wouldn't be the least surprised if this is another type of swine-flu. The usual trend is bird to pig to human.

[hogwyld]

23. This is all a conspiracy

by radical Islam to rid the world of unclean pork.:sarcasm:

[Theres-a]

24. hogwyld

*heh,heh*

[hippiechick]

29. "they hate us for our barbeques"

:wtf: I can hear it now ...

[baldguy]

27. How long before they're ground up & sold to US meat manufacturers for feed?

[Blue Diadem]

28. Blood pouring from their bodies?

:scared:

For some reason that doesn't sound like melamine poisoning to me.

combine that with the fish "ebola-like" virus in the Great Lakes, the bee's
mysterious deaths, the red-ant virus..

:scared:

[KamaAina]

31. "The disease began killing pigs after the Chinese New Year celebrations in February"

Would you believe, it's the Year of the Pig?

No, really. You just can't make this stuff up. :eyes:

edit: punctuation

[demo dutch]

35. CHECK OUT THIS HORRIBLE PICTURE!

from a Dutch Newspaper on this subject. Note the photo of the pigs

http://www.telegraaf.nl/buitenland/63215571/Chinese_varkensrollade.html?p=19,1

[demo dutch]

37. Mysterious illness kills pigs in China-China Tells Little About Illness That Kills Pigs

Source: NY Times

HONG KONG, May 7 — A mysterious epidemic is killing pigs in southeastern China, but international and Hong Kong authorities said Monday that the Chinese government was providing little information about it or the contaminated wheat gluten that has caused death and illness in pets in the United States.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/08/world/asia/08hongkong.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

---

Horrible, Check out this link in Dutch Newspaper and notice the picture of the pigs!
Beware the picture is graphic!

http://www.telegraaf.nl/buitenland/63215571/Chinese_varkensrollade.html?p=19,1

[Cobalt Violet]

38. Maybe they'll end up on the market here.

Or so other place. I don't the greed will miss any chance to profit no matter who pays with his/her life.

[candice]

46. Pigs are being "deep discounted" to the unsuspecting...

[Lone_Star_Dem]

39. Other LBN thread on this

Here --->> http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2837850

[demo dutch]

40. Sorry!

[Lone_Star_Dem]

41. No need to apologize

It's an important issue and I hope your thread is combined with the original so that all the articles can be in one area. The pictures of the pigs in those body cages was like something from an S&M movie.

As they've mentioned in the other thread most virus jump to pigs right before they do to humans. This is very troubling indeed.

[NYC]

45. What was the purpose of the body cages?

I didn't understand that.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

49. I'm not sure myself

I assume it's to make them easier to handle, something of a cruel convince for those who are farming them.

[NYC]

50. You think they wore them while they were alive?

The thought deeply horrifies me.

[achtung_circus]

42. From my clipping service

Unidentified illness kills more than 300 pigs in southern China
06.may.07
Canadian Press

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/agriculture/story.html?id=a733cded-b3a1-4e8d-aa69-6eeab86ee4c9&k=21176

HONG KONG -- An unidentified animal illness has, according to this story, spread in two southern Chinese cities, infecting at least 1,300 pigs and killing more than 300.
No human infections have been reported.
TMing Pao Daily News newspaper was cited as reporting that the illness started killing pigs in Yunfu city in southern Guangdong province in early April, eventually claiming the lives of more than 300 of the animals.
The Apple Daily newspaper said the illness killed 80 per cent of the pig population in Yunfu.
The Ming Pao said more than 1,000 pigs in nearby Gaoyao city have fallen ill since late April, with some dying.
Apple Daily said symptoms of the unidentified disease included loss of appetite, high fever and bleeding.
The newspaper said the disease had been spread by people dumping dead pigs by the dozens into rivers. The Wen Wei Po newspaper quoted an unidentified local official saying animal experts have ruled out a disease that can cross over to humans but have not diagnosed the illness.
A man who answered the phone at the Gaoyao city government denied a pig illness had surfaced, or that any pigs had died for unusual reasons. The man refused to give his name.

[Eurobabe]

43. check their food, very simple.

[candice]

47. imported tossed pet food from the U.S. with fake gluten a la melamine?

[Zenlitened]

51. UPDATE: Chinese officials say they've ID'd the illness, have vaccine

From China Daily...

Blue-eared pig disease could be behind deaths

By Li Wenfang (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-05-10 06:56

GUANGZHOU: Initial indications suggest that porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS), or blue-eared pig disease, has caused the deaths of more than 300 pigs in Yunfu, in southern China's Guangdong Province.

The disease, which broke out late last month, was the result of a secondary bacterial infection by the PRRS virus, according to a statement released yesterday by the provincial department of agriculture.

The PRRS virus entered China from overseas in the mid 1990's and has recently shown signs of mutation. It cannot spread from animals to people and is said to be under control in the district.

Tests for the disease are available, and a vaccine against the disease has received State approval and is to be distributed soon, said the statement.

More...
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-05/10/content_869307.htm