Four cases of pig-borne disease reported
(AP)
Updated: 2005-08-23 07:09

Pockets of infection have been discovered in recent days. Last week, two deaths were reported in Jiangsu province in the east, and Hong Kong has found a handful of cases in the past month.

In June, two human cases were reported in Guangdong.

One of them, a man from the city of Yangjiang, contracted the disease through a wound in his hand while butchering pigs, state media said then.

The meat from the pigs he slaughtered was sold at a local market by his wife but investigators were not able to find the buyers, state media said.

Yangjiang, along with Chao'an County and the cities of Nanxiong and Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong, were the latest areas which had human infections, Xinhua said Monday.

Medical teams have been sent to investigate and help locals take protective measures, it said.

The Guangdong departments of health and agriculture have also been mobilized "to take emergency measures and work strenuously to prevent the disease from spreading," Xinhua said.

China's south has been the breeding ground for diseases that jump between animals and humans because of their close proximity.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome first emerged in Guangdong and killed nearly 800 people worldwide before subsiding in 2003. Beijing was criticized then for being slow to share information on the outbreak.