Health authorities said Monday a fatal strain of avian influenza is spreading quickly across South Korea, resulting in sudden drops in the consumption and price of chickens and ducks.

The authorities said new cases of the highly infectious disease have been reported in the country's southern regions after the original outbreak in the central part of the nation, alarming farms as well as health and quarantine officials nationwide.

After fowl at five farms in Umseong, North Chungcheong Province, were confirmed as having symptoms of avian influenza between Dec. 15th and 19th, quarantine officials found similar cases at a duck farm on Dec. 20th in Cheonan, South Chungcheong Province, more than 20 kilometers south of the farm where the first case among chickens was confirmed.

Worries heightened after health officials announced that the farm provides young breeding ducks to 22 out of the 52 duck breeding farms across the country.

Avian influenza was then detected on Dec. 21st among tens of thousands of poultry at farms in Naju, South Jeolla Province, and Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province, raising the specter of a nationwide bird flu epidemic.

Quarantine authorities are not sure how the killer flu has been infecting poultry in the country.