Swine disease contained in Mizoram, alert sounded in Tripura

The Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome (PRRS) disease which has so far killed at least 3,500 pigs in Mizoram has largely been contained, officials said in Aizawl on Wednesday.

The Tripura government's animal resource development department (ARDD) also sounded an alert in the villages and government farms along the Tripura-Mizoram border. Tripura shares a 109-km inter-state border with Mizoram.

"In between April and June, at least 3,500 pigs were killed due to PRRS disease in Mizoram. The disease is largely contained since last week," an official of Mizoram's animal husbandry and veterinary department said.

The official said the disease had spread to five of the eight districts in Mizoram -- Champhai, Serchhip, Siaha, Lunglei and Lawngtlai.

The animal husbandry and veterinary department officials suspected that the viral disease spread in Mizoram after the entry of infected piglets from adjacent Myanmar.

This is the second PRRS outbreak in the northeastern state. In March-April 2013, the disease first spread in Mizoram killing over 3,000 pigs in six districts.

Mizoram has also stopped importing poultry, pigs and cattle from Myanmar and Bangladesh as well as other northeastern states due to the disease.

"We have asked the district magistrates to take suitable steps in stopping import of chickens, birds, ducks, eggs, cattle and pigs from Bangladesh and neighbouring states of the northeast in view of the diseases among cattle and pigs," the Mizoram official said.

The state government has issued an order banning the sale of all domestic animals from villages within and outside the disease-affected districts in Mizoram.

The government also asked the people not to sell or consume pork, cattle meat and poultry products in the disease-affected and adjoining areas.

Mizoram shares an unfenced international border of 404 km with Myanmar and 318 km with Bangladesh, with immense scope for smuggling of animals, drugs, arms and ammunition and other things across the border.

Tripura government's ARDD also asked the people to report to the authorities if they found any dead pig in their locality.

"Our experts have visited villages along the Mizoram border and did not find any dead pig or pig with PRRS symptoms," Tripura government's animal resource development department (ARDD) director Manoranjan Sarkar told IANS.

--IANS

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