(VOVworld)- Avian influenza (AI) has spread throughout many parts of the world over the past few days posing great challenges for the poultry sector. A number of measures have been implemented to prevent an epidemic.

The government of Uganda set up a national task force to fight avian influenza. At a press conference in Kampala last Sunday, Uganda’s Minister of Agriculture Vincent Ssempijja said that the task force made up of central and local officials, and local and international health and agricultural officials, and epidemiologists is tasked with preventing an epidemic. Mr. Ssempijja called on the public to make prompt reports on suspected cases and massive deaths of birds, domestic or wild birds. Minister Ssempijja recommended isolating domestic birds from wild birds to prevent transmission of the virus. He also urged people to strictly follow advice on disease prevention from human health and animal health agencies. Health agencies in Uganda have reported AI death and infection in the central region.

On Sunday, local authorities in Gifu prefecture in central Japan culled 80,000 chickens at a farm in Yamagata city following the detection of the H5 strain of bird flu the previous day. The Gifu administration has limited the transportation of poultry and eggs to a radius of 10 km from the farm. Since November 2016, Japan has detected cases of H5 bird flu at farms in Niigata, Aomori, Hokkaido, and Miyazaki province.

In a report last Wednesday, China's Ministry of Agriculture said one bird flu case of the H5N6 strain, China’s fifth bird flu outbreak since last October, was detected at a goose farm in Hunan province. Local authorities culled more than 2,000 fowls after the outbreak bringing the total poultry cull in China since October to more than 175,000. A representative of the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture said the recent outbreaks have been contained.

Thousands of ducks were culled earlier this month in southwestern France as the French government works to prevent the spread of the H5N8 strain throughout Europe. The measure affected free range ducks in the Gers, Landes, Hautes-Pyrenees and Pyrenees-Atlantiques regions where ducks were exposed to the H5N8 virus by wild birds.