Hong Kong health authorities are slaughtering almost 20,000 chickens at a market after a chicken carcass there was found to be infected with bird flu.
The precautionary move came after a dead chicken at the city’s main wholesale market and two wild birds tested positive for the virus.
Authorities raised the bird flu alert level to “serious” and suspended live poultry imports while they trace the origin of the infected chicken.
All chickens at the Wholesale Poultry Market were slaughtered and extra inspections were ordered at chicken farms and hospitals.
A bird flu expert at the University of Hong Kong stressed that while there is a need to be cautious, there is no need to panic.
Hong Kong was the site of the world’s first major outbreak of bird flu among humans in 1997, when six people died. Millions of birds were then culled.
