10 bird flu-hit Indonesian provinces in Sumatra

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Bengkulu, (ANTARA News) - At least 10 Indonesian provinces in Sumatra have been hit by deadly bird flu or avian influenza illness, an official of the Agriculture Ministry said here Saturday."Total number of Indonesian province hit by the bird flu disease is 20, with 10 of them are in Sumatra," husbandry health functional official of the Agriculture Ministry's Husbandry Directorate General, Didin, told a coordinating meeting on bird flu.The bird flu-hit provinces are Lampung, Bengkulu, North Sumatra, West Sumatra, Bangka Belitung, Jambi, South Sumatra, Aceh, Riau and Riau islands.Didin said his office depopulated or killed 154 poultry in bird flu-prone provinces from January to August this year."The government has allocated Rp1.57 billion to compensate poultry farmers whose animals were culled. The government compensated Rp12,000 for each poultry," he said. The Agriculture Ministry, he said, formed avian influenza controlling units to

assess fund to combat the deadly illness across the country.The campaign against the avian influenza was carried out door-to-door as the disease was indeed found in backyard farm, he said. Bird flu in Indonesia grabbed the world's attention in May when seven members of a single family in North Sumatra province died of the virus - the largest recorded cluster to date.The WHO concluded that limited human-to-human transmission likely occurred, but the virus did not spread beyond the blood family members.It said the avian influenza virus that has killed at least 135 people worldwide (excluded Indonesia) as of early last August since it began ravaging Asian poultry stocks in late 2003.(*) COPYRIGHT © 2006 ANTARA September 2, 2006

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