Central China's Hunan Province said it has taken effective
measures to prevent epidemics after about 2 billion rats chomped
their way through cropland around the Dongting Lake, the country's
second largest freshwater lake.
"It's not possible for rodent-borne diseases to break out in the
lake area," said Chen Xiaochun, vice director of the provincial
health department.
Local health authorities have been watching closely over the
rodent situation after the rats fled their flooded island homes and
invaded 22 counties around the Dongting Lake last week, he told a
press conference on Wednesday.
Results of their observation are reported daily to the
provincial health department and the public, he said.
Meanwhile, local health and disease prevention and control
authorities have intensified management of raticide and pesticide,
for fear they might contaminate food and water, Chen added.
No human infection of any rat-borne disease has been reported in
the central Chinese province since 1944.
The provincial government also ruled out widespread suspicions
that rats flooded the area because one of their natural enemies
--snakes -- had been served at dinner tables.
"The Dongting Lake area is not an ideal habitat for snakes,"
said Deng Sanlong, a top forestry official in the province, "and
the only two species that inhabitate the region feed largely on
fish and frogs."
He said the top enemy of the rats are hawks that spend winter in
the wetland around the lake but fly away in spring.
China's Ministry of Agriculture and the Hunan provincial
government have allocated 900,000 yuan in total to eradicate the
rats.
(Xinhua News Agency July 19, 2007)
