China's State Forestry Administration said in Beijing on Monday it had received no report of avian flu among migratory birds since June of this year.

 

The conclusion was based on the observations from 118 monitoring stations for epidemic diseases of terricolous wild animals across the country, said Zhuo Rongsheng, director of the administration's Department of Wildlife and Forest Plants Protection.

 

The 118 monitoring stations under the administration serve as the mainstay of China's bird flue monitoring system.

 

More than 400 similar monitoring stations have also been established by local governments across China.

 

"All the local forestry authorities have banned people, livestock and poultry from entering the areas where migratory birds gather, in a bid to avoid mutual contagion of possible avian flu among migratory birds, livestock and poultry," Zhou said.

 

Since autumn this year, the H5N1 avian flu has been reported in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Hunan Province in center, and Anhui Province in the east, but no human infection of avian flu has occurred in China, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.

 

Local governments in the avian flu-hit areas have slaughtered all poultry and taken compulsory quarantine measures on all those within five kilometers, the ministry said.

 

(Xinhua News Agency November 1, 2005)