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The COA's Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine (BAPHIQ) made the remarks after the World Health Organization (WHO) warned that once hogs are infected with an avian-flu virus, the possibility of humans being infected will increase.

BAPHIQ Deputy Director Yeh Ying said the bureau began monitoring local hogs for influenza in July, 1998.

"Over the past six years, we have never discovered the H5 or H7 avian-flu viruses in locally raised hogs," Yeh said.

Last year, he said, the bureau examined 1,326 hog serum samples and 1,680 samples of excretion from hog lungs, noses and tracheas collected from six pork markets and 68 hog farms in Taiwan and 18 hog ranches on the frontline islands of Kinmen and Matsu.

"We only found common pig influenza viruses in those samples," Yeh said.

As local poultry farmers usually do not raise hogs, Yeh said, the possibility of locally raised hogs becoming infected with an avian virus is relatively low.

Source: eFeedLink - 10th February 2004