The Ulsan Institute of Health and Environment announced Tuesday that it will extend the "Special Quarantine Measures Period for Catastrophic Livestock Diseases" by one month through the end of March, originally scheduled to conclude at the end of February.
The measure is a preemptive response to recent simultaneous outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza (AI) and African swine fever (ASF) occurring nationwide regardless of region.
According to the institute, ASF previously tended to occur in northern regions such as Gangwon and Gyeonggi provinces, while AI mainly appeared in the Jeolla and Chungcheong regions. However, these regional boundaries have recently been breaking down. Concerns about the diseases entering Ulsan are growing as confirmed cases continue to emerge in neighboring South Gyeongsang Province, which had been considered a disease-free area.
All precision and clinical tests conducted on Ulsan farms to date have returned negative results. To maintain this disease-free status, the institute plans to strengthen quarantine measures by conducting two additional rounds of ASF precision and environmental testing at pig farms in March, and performing AI precision and environmental testing twice monthly at egg-laying poultry farms.
"To prevent the spread of livestock diseases, immediate reporting is paramount when abnormal signs such as deaths are discovered on farms," said Shim Min-ryeong, director of the Ulsan Institute of Health and Environment. "We urge farmers and workers to strictly comply with quarantine protocols and promptly report any suspected cases."