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Following is the transcript of remarks made by the Secretary for Food and Health, Dr Ko Wing-man, after attending a public function today (November 25):
Reporter: (About stepping up the monitoring measures for avian influenza.)
Secretary for Food and Health: With the arrival of winter and the drop of ambient temperature, it is expected that the activities of both seasonal influenza as well as avian influenza will increase. Therefore, we will correspondingly step up our measures in monitoring both the carcasses of birds found as well as our local live poultry farms.
Reporter: There is no plan to lift the ban on the importation of chickens from the Mainland?
Secretary for Food and Health: I need to clarify that there is currently no ban on poultry imported from the Mainland. It is mainly because in the past winter season, we had a positive result in examining one of the batches of imported poultry. Following that, we closed the wholesale market for 21 days. The Mainland authority also correspondingly enhanced their control measures, leading to a decrease in the live poultry supply from the Mainland.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Wednesday, November 25, 2015
Issued at HKT 17:28
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