BISHKEK, April 26 (RIA Novosti) – Kyrgyzstan’s authorities have banned imports of poultry from China over the spread of a new strain of bird flu, a spokesman for the Kyrgyz Economics Ministry said Friday.
“According to data from the director general of the international epizootic bureau, a new type of avian influenza, H7N9, has been registered among wild birds in the cities of Shanghai, Beijing and a number of Chinese provinces,” Ermek Dzhanuzakov said.
“The state inspection for veterinary and phytosanitary safety has adopted a resolution to ban imports of birds and poultry products from China to reduce the risk of infection spreading” beyond China's borders, he said.
According to the Kyrgyz government, China is one of the largest importers of poultry and poultry products to the Central Asian country, behind only the United States. Over 10,000 metric tons of chicken meat is brought to Kyrgyzstan from China every month.
A total of 114 people are believed to have recently come down with H7N9 in China. Twenty-three of them have died.
Russia’s chief public health official Gennady Onishchenko said earlier in April that his consumer rights watchdog Rospotrebnadzor was considering restrictions on poultry meat imports from China.
