TACLOBAN CITY – The municipality of Burauen recorded an African Swine Fever (ASF) case, making it the seventh municipality in Leyte with a confirmed ASF case.
Laboratory result handed over by Department of Agriculture-8 Regional Executive Director Angel Enriquez to Burauen Mayor Juanito Renomeron Thursday said a sample was taken from Barangay Pawa turned out positive, thus, hogs within a 500-meter radius from where it was taken would be subjected to depopulation as soon as possible.
Dr. Annalou Detablan of the Burauen Municipal Agriculturist Office appealed for affected hog raisers' cooperation.
She noted that depopulating the hogs within the area is the best way to prevent the virus from spreading, citing that the move is meant to protect the town's hog industry.
Detablan warned that the inability to help cushion the effects of the virus would negatively impact all the residents of town as it would increase the prices of alternative meat products, even fish and other food products.
She advised hog raisers outside the concerned area to strictly follow biosecurity measures by ensuring they disinfect themselves before interacting with their animals, to prevent contamination.
Among the measures are installing footbaths, using clean clothes, always wearing slippers or boots, and avoiding giving the animals food scraps and other waste materials instead of proper animal feeds.
Following the development, the local government unit of Burauen is extending the implementation of Executive Order No. 01-2021 which created the Municipal Task Force on Animal-borne Diseases last Jan. 19.
Among other policies, said EO banned the entry of live hogs and pork products from other places as well as the selling of pork products outside of the town.
To assist in determining the extent of ASF infection in Leyte, and to help in the fight against the disease, the Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) has deployed six technical personnel in Eastern Visayas.
Initially, they will be fielded over the so-called "green zones" or areas where no single incident of ASF has been reported yet to help the local government units alleviate their fears by offering technical assistance through blood sample collection and free rapid and PCR test.
They will also help save the green zones so that hog raisers can freely move, sell, or slaughter their hogs without fear of ASF.
They are likewise tasked to train the LGU-based technicians on how to effectively collect samples, and give other related technical support to prevent the spread of the virus.
Over 3,000 pigs have already been culled in Leyte since ASF was first recorded on Jan. 14 in Abuyog.
Other towns infested with ASF in Leyte are La Paz, Javier, Dulag, Tanauan, Palo, and MacArthur.