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Japanese Kobe cows have a beef, and Japanese chickens are broiling: In the first one and a half month’s of this year’s record hot summer 959 milk cows, 235 meat cows, 136,000 egg chickens, and 289,000 meat chickens have died of heatstroke. Pigs aren’t faring so well either, with 657 succumbing to the heat. These numbers are up only slightly from the last survey two years ago for cows and pigs, but more than double for chickens. The Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry, who conducted the survey, is instructing farmers to have adequate heat shield materials and ventilation fans in animal enclosures. The heatstroke figures do not include Miyazaki Prefecture, which suffered a foot-and-mouth disease breakout this year, muddling the ability to determine cause of death.

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Sample tissue from ducks in Takeo province that died in an outbreak of a disease officials could not identify earlier this week have tested positive for the H5N1 virus, commonly known as bird flu, officials at the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said Tuesday.

In light of the test result, officials said they will move ahead with Monday’s order from the provincial agriculture department to destroy all live ducks and halt duck meat sales in the affected area. Since the outbreak began last month, 16,442 ducks have died and at least 31,000 live ducks are exhibiting symptoms of the virus.

Ly Sovann, deputy director of the Communicable Diseases Control Department at the Ministry of Health, confirmed the positive test result on Tuesday and related the contents of an unreleased statement from the Agriculture Ministry.

“The statement identified the bird flu-affected area as Pralay village, Romenh commune, Koh Andeth district. All ducks within 5 kilometres of the village will be incinerated, sales of duck meat will be stopped and local officials within 10 kilometres of the area must monitor both ducks and humans for signs of infection,” Ly Sovann said.

Read the full story at The Phnom Penh Post