Pigs began to die at the Lenin farm in the village of Kievka, in the Apanasenkovsky District, on March 15, and preliminary tests suggested an outbreak of the disease. Further tests on Thursday confirmed the deaths had been caused by the African swine fever.
Some 50 pigs have so far died. Authorities have announced that all the animals at the farm are to be culled as a preventive measure.
There are a total of 189 pigs at the farm and 2,500 pigs in the village. The area has been quarantined, and the Emergency Situations Ministry has set up a local headquarters to control the spread of the virus.
This is the second outbreak of African swine fever in the Stavropol Region this year. In January, the virus was confirmed at a farm in the Kursky District. As a result, 2,600 pigs were slaughtered. Some 5,000 pigs were also culled or died from the virus this summer in Russia's North Ossetia.
The highly contagious virus was first registered in 1903 in South Africa. It does not pose a threat to humans.
