Monday 30 April 2012
Korea
Rabies alert
South Korea has issued a rabies alert after a dog tested positive for the potentially deadly disease, the country's farm ministry said on Saturday.
The Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said a dog on a farm in Hwaseong some 55 km south-west of Seoul, tested positive for rabies.
Local quarantine officials have been ordered to inoculate all domestic animals in the vicinity of the farm and to conduct decontamination.
Also called hydrophobia, rabies is a contagious zoonotic disease, meaning it can be passed from animals to humans.
It is usually contracted when domestic pets or livestock come in contact with infected wild animals such as raccoons.
Thanks to comprehensive inoculation, South Korea reported no rabies cases from 1985 through 1992, but a case was reported in the mountainous Gangwon Province in 1993.
Isolated cases have since been reported, primarily near the demilitarised zone that separates South and North Korea, with four cases discovered in 2011.
Source: Argentine Beef Packers S.A.
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