# 342
Today South Korea announced their intention to extend the culling zone from 500 meters to three kilometers surrounding the site of the recent outbreak of the H5N1 virus at a poultry farm near Cheonan.
S. Korea to cull 660,000 animals to stem bird flu
SEOUL (AFP) - South Korean health officials Monday announced plans to slaughter more than 660,000 poultry and pigs to try to stem a new outbreak of potentially deadly bird flu.
The agriculture ministry said it would expand a mass cull that began Sunday around a poultry farm near the central city of Cheonan.
The original plan was to cull 273,000 poultry, mostly chickens, and 6,000 pigs within 500 meters (1,650 feet) of the infection site. Some 5,500 birds have already been culled and buried in a quarantine area guarded by troops.
"Today we decided to extend the culling to all farms in a three-kilometer quarantine zone," ministry spokesman Yoon Yong-Koo told AFP. This will take in an additional 92 ducks, 70,000 quails and 315,600 chickens.
"Altogether, we will cull about 665,000 animals," Yoon said.
Quarantine officials fear pigs could act as a "mixing bowl" in which a human pandemic strain of the H5N1 virus could evolve, because the animals can harbor both human and avian flu viruses.
The South Korean government obviously takes the threat seriously and has been particularly agressive in their culling program to rid their country of the H5N1 virus.
