A paper submitted by a Taiwanese academic to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s scientific journal in July said that the H6N1 strain of avian influenza is continuing to mutate in Taiwan, with dogs now also susceptible to the virus.
National Taiwan University school of veterinary science professor Wang Ching-ho (王金和) wrote that he learned last year that canines have contracted the H6N1 bird flu strain, adding that after further research he found that roughly 2.1 percent of canines in Taiwan have been infected.
In an interview with Chinese-language newspaper the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times), Wang said he came across the first case several years ago when examining a dog’s temperament. He and fellow researchers discovered that the dog was infected with H6N1 after conducting virus isolation procedures.
Wang said it is possible that certain biological similarities between canines and birds make them susceptible to the virus.
The strain of H6N1 in Taiwan has not only infected dogs, but has also become the first known case world-wide to infect humans, Wang said. Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control discovered in May that a 20-year-old female dog in Nantou County had also become infected with the virus.
When asked why he had not informed the government in May about dogs being suspected carriers of the H6N1 viral strain, Wang said it was not a disease mandated by the World Organization for Animal Health that had to be reported.
However, Wang said that he had mentioned the report several years ago during a seminar at National Taiwan University, adding that he had also sent an e-mail to the Council of Agriculture about the issue.
In response, Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine director-general Chang Su-san (張淑賢) said that while the case of a dog being infected by H6N1 was the first in Taiwan, the viral strain has a 40-year history here.
The bureau did not need to be informed of the case, as it was a common and low-pathogenic virus often seen on chicken farms, she said, adding the bureau did not place great emphasis on the report.
Unsatisfied with the response, freelance journalist Lee Hui-jen (李惠仁), who spent more than six years investigating avian influenza in Taiwan and directed the documentary A Secret that Can’t be Exposed (不能戳的秘密) said the bureau’s inaction was indirectly escalating the danger the endemic H6N1 strain posed to the nation.
A mild avian influenza outbreak earlier this year included allegedly highly pathogenic bird flu strains, the H5N8 strain and a new H5N2 strain, Lee said, adding that virus strains are starting to mutate in Taiwan, but that the bureau was not paying any attention to it.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
RSS