NSW: Slaughter underway to contain Newcastle disease outbreak

AAP General News (Australia)
08-22-1999
NSW: Slaughter underway to contain Newcastle disease outbreak

The destruction of 8,000 birds with deadly Newcastle disease has begun at a poultry
farm in Sydney's outer western suburbs.

A NSW Agriculture spokesman says the outbreak at the Schofields farm's fully contained,
with the infected birds quarantined there.

But he says it'll be three weeks before authorities know if they've totally
eradicated the disease, because of its incubation period.

More than two million chickens were slaughtered in April following an outbreak of the
highly contagious disease at Mangrove Mountain Ridge, on the state's Central
Coast.

AAP RTV smf/nd/sub

KEYWORD: NEWCASTLE (SYDNEY)

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