China News Service, Hong Kong, November 17th. In recent days, wild boars appeared in the urban area and injured people in Hong Kong. The Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government (AFCD) carried out a wild boar capture operation on Shenwan Road, Aberdeen on the 17th, capturing 7 wild boars. Wild boars will be destroyed humanely to reduce the number of wild boars in the area and protect the safety of the public.
The problem of wild boar nuisance in the urban area of Hong Kong is becoming more and more serious. Recently, there has been a "wild boar attacking police officer" incident. The Fisheries and Conservation Department has decided to capture and humanely destroy wild boars in the urban area from November 12.
A spokesperson for the Fisheries and Conservation Department said that the department conducted a wild boar capture operation at 8 pm on the 17th at Shum Wan Road. The veterinarian used an anesthesia gun to capture 7 wild boars and used drug injections for humane destruction. The operation was completed at 10 pm.
The spokesman said that because people often feed wild boars on Shum Wan Road, they are used to haunt the roads there and demand food from passers-by and even chasing vehicles.
From 2018 to October this year, the AFCD carried out 12 capture and relocation operations in the area of the above site, relocating 35 wild boars to remote rural locations, and carried out contraception or sterilization for 27 wild boars.
However, the capture and contraception/relocation operations failed to effectively control the wild boar nuisance, and large groups of wild boar continued to appear or even gather in the area, posing a danger to the public and road users.
The spokesman said that the AFCD will continue to give priority to wild boar catching operations to deal with places where a large number of wild boars are infested and where wild boars have caused injuries or poses a danger to the public.
The spokesman again urged the public not to feed wild boars under any circumstances.
Wild boars are not pets but potentially dangerous large wild animals. Feeding activities will attract wild boars to haunt or even gather in urban areas, which may not only cause danger to themselves, but also endanger the safety of other citizens and cause nuisance to the daily life of the general public.
Wild boars also have the opportunity to spread common human and animal diseases, such as tuberculosis, hepatitis E, influenza A and streptococcus suis infection, which pose risks to public health.
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