Residents seek check-ups after Seoul's first bird flu case
SEOUL (AFP) — The first bird flu outbreak in South Korea's capital Seoul was caused by the virulent H5N1 strain, the agriculture ministry said Wednesday, as residents in the affected district scrambled for medical checks.
The case at an aviary in the eastern district of Gwangjin brings to 34 the number of bird flu cases nationwide since April. Not all have been confirmed to be H5N1, which is potentially deadly to humans.
Quarantine officials have slaughtered all 53 chickens, turkeys and pheasants at the aviary, and also poultry at a nearby public park in the same district and at an amusement park in southern Seoul.
No outbreak has been reported except in Gwangjin.
The Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention said it asked all hospitals in Seoul to keep a close eye on their patients and immediately report any suspected cases of human bird flu.
The public health clinic in Gwangjin said Wednesday it had been swamped with inquiry calls or visits by residents, some with a high fever and headache, for medical checks. No bird flu infections were reported.
"They all turned out to be completely irrelevant to bird flu," Mo Hyun-Hee, head of the clinic, told AFP.
South Korea has not recorded any human cases of bird flu. A soldier taken to hospital last month was found not to have the disease.
The agriculture ministry said quarantine authorities were continuing to decontaminate all aviaries and poultry farms in the city. Public access has been limited to those areas.
It was also trying to trace poultry dealers and farms which had sold birds to a market at Seongnam south of Seoul, which was the suspected supplier of infected pheasants to the Gwangjin aviary.
More than six million chickens and ducks have been slaughtered since the country's latest bird flu outbreak was reported on April 1. The previous outbreak was between November 2006 and March last year.
The H5N1 strain has killed more than 240 people worldwide since late 2003.
