Chinese Bird Flu: Lotsa Dead Ducks

Add vaccines to the list of goods you don't want to buy from China:

More than 9,000 ducks that died in a suspected outbreak of bird flu in southern China had been vaccinated against the disease, a report said Monday.

China's agriculture ministry said on Saturday that 9,830 ducks had died in a village outside the southern city of Guangzhou between September 5 and 13.

Samples were being tested for the H5N1 bird flu virus and a further 30,000 ducks had been culled by officials since the outbreak.

Yu Yedong, director of the Guangdong Animal Epidemic Prevention Centre, told the Standard, a Hong Kong newspaper, that the ducks had been vaccinated against the virus. (AFP)

A second round of vaccines had been planned to create a higher degree of effectiveness, but the ducks started croaking before they had a chance to feel a little prick.

Any way you cut this story, it's more bad news for China and more bad news on the bird flu front.