Bird flu hits U.S., poultry culled
S. Korea ban on U.S. chickens 'premature'
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Wearing a protective suit, a South Korean official stands guard at a farm affected by bird flu.
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Fish replaces chicken at Vietnam's Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets.
Thai vendors are giving chicken away in a bid to allay fears.
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Nations hit by bird flu
•S. Korea
•Japan
•Thailand
•Vietnam
•Cambodia
•Indonesia
•Pakistan
•China
•Laos
•Taiwan (different strain)
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(CNN) -- Delaware's agriculture secretary says it is "way premature" for South Korea to ban U.S. poultry products after a strain of bird flu not known to affect humans was found on a farm in the state.
Michael Scuse told CNN the infected flock of about 12,000 birds -- all destroyed Saturday morning -- belonged to a private farmer who sold chickens in live markets in New York city.
Japan became the second Asian nation to suspend all imports of American poultry, after South Korea immediately halted imports following news of the U.S. outbreak.
South Korea imports about 40,000 tons of U.S. poultry each year, about half its total poultry imports.
Much of that chicken comes from the multi-billion dollar industry on the Delmarva peninsula shared by Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.
Seoul should not have banned the American product, Scuse said, because lab tests showed the chickens had the H7 strain of bird flu which was "in no way shape or form what they have in Asia."
Asia has been rampaged by the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain of the flu, which has led to the culling of tens of millions of chickens across the region. At least 18 people in Thailand and Vietnam have also died from the disease.
A spokesman for the U.S. Department of Agriculture told CNN there is no evidence the H7 strain -- which has a low pathogenicity -- can be transmitted to humans.
While Scuse said he was "fairly confident" the virus had not spread, flocks within a two-mile radius of the infected farm were being tested, with final results due Tuesday.
A thorough investigation is being carried out to see how the chickens got bird flu.
Outbreaks of bird flu in the Delmarva area are uncommon but not unheard of, according to Scuse. This case is the second in 10 years for Delaware.
Back in Asia, the World Health Organization says the bird flu virus that killed two Vietnamese sisters did not contain human genes, meaning there is no sign the virus has mutated into a new, more contagious form.
Meanwhile, U.N. experts are investigating whether the bird flu has spread to pigs.
A Vietnam representative of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said Friday preliminary tests found the bird flu virus in the snouts of pigs in Hanoi.
But the results do not necessarily mean the swine are infected, the agency added, saying the nasal swabs may just be confirming the presence of infected chicken dropping on their snouts.
More rigorous tests, looking for the virus or antibodies in the blood, still need to be carried out.
-- CNN producer Yvonne Lee and senior medical producer Christy Feig in Washington, correspondent Sohn Jie-Ae in Seoul and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Copyright 2004 CNN. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Associated Press contributed to this report.
