Jakarta (ANTARA) - The number of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) cases in the country reached 317,889 as of Thursday, with 21 provinces detecting infections, coordinator of the expert team of the FMD task force, Wiku Adisasmito, informed.

Speaking at an online press conference here on Thursday, he said that FMD cases have so far been detected in 231 districts and cities, with 106,925 of the 317,889 infected animals recovering from the disease.

"As many as 2,016 heads (of animals) died, and 3,489 heads of the total cases were conditionally slaughtered," he added.

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He stressed that even though the FMD virus is not transmissible to humans, they can become carriers of the virus and transmit it to healthy animals.

Therefore, the community must work together on FMD handling because the disease can significantly impact Indonesia's economic development, he said.

"With the large number of cattle that must be subject to conditional slaughter and there are also those that died, of course, this will greatly impact the sales of livestock and animal products consumed by the community," he remarked.

According to the FMD task force, the provinces affected by the disease outbreak are Riau, Riau Islands, Aceh, West Sumatra, Bangka Belitung, Bengkulu, North Sumatra, Lampung, South Sumatra, Jambi, Banten, Bali, East Java, West Java, Central Java, Yogyakarta, Jakarta, South Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, West Kalimantan, and West Nusa Tenggara.

Meanwhile, the provinces that have not been affected by the outbreak are East Kalimantan, East Nusa Tenggara, West Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, North Sulawesi, Gorontalo, Southeast Sulawesi, Maluku, North Maluku, Papua, and West Papua.

Adisasmito informed that in three provinces, all districts and cities have been affected by FMD: East Java, Central Java, and Bangka Belitung.

To curb the spread of FMD in Indonesia, the Ministry of Agriculture rolled out a vaccination program for livestock from Sidoarjo district, East Java, on June 14, 2022.

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Translator: Devi Nindy, Raka Adji
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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