The Ministry of Health announced at a bird flu prevention event
in Beijing's Tongzhou District yesterday that it was starting to
distribute 300,000 guidebooks on the prevention and control of bird
flu among humans to selected rural areas.
Another 600,000 sets of pictorial booklets are being distributed
jointly by the ministry and China Association for Science and
Technology (CAST) along
with the guidebooks.
The materials are directed at farmers, explaining in simple
words what bird flu is, how it spreads and what symptoms to look
for in people, and the ministry's information office said they were
intended to help raise their awareness and ability to protect
themselves against the disease.
Vice Health Minister Jiang Zuojun was at Monday's ceremony and
presented some of the materials to health department officials and
primary and high school students.?
He said early detection, reporting, quarantine and treatment are
crucial to curbing epidemics in rural regions, adding that the
ministry would be sending out additional materials in future.
?
The same day, an official from northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur
Autonomous Region, the part of the country most hit by outbreaks of
H5N1 avian influenza among birds, told China Daily that
infections there have been brought under control in all affected
areas.
"All infections have been capped within outbreak sites and have
not spread further," said Xing Qinghua, a spokesperson for the
regional animal husbandry department. "In line with statutes,
experts have been dispatched to check whether it is time to lift
some quarantines."
The Ministry of Agriculture said last night that the quarantine
in Xinjiang's Zepu County has already been lifted.
"We are now engaged in a campaign to vaccinate all kinds of
poultry in the region," said Xing, and 80 percent of poultry have
already been given "effective" doses.
All vaccines in use were produced by state-designated companies
and provided by the Ministry of Agriculture, with a record made for
each inoculated bird, he added.
China has reported 30 bird flu outbreaks in wild birds and
poultry this year and confirmed three human infections, including
two fatalities.
The government has vowed to invest hugely in the prevention and
control of the disease and strengthened surveillance for human
cases, especially in its vast rural areas.
(Xinhua News Agency, China Daily December 6, 2005)
