Chinese quarantine department officials check live chickens scheduled to be transported to Hong Kong

China's official Xinhua news agency says a new bird flu outbreak has killed more than 3,000 chickens in the northwest.

The Ministry of Agriculture told Xinhua that the July 14 outbreak in Xinjiang region's Aksu city is under control.  No human infections have been reported.

Saturday's report says the deadly H5N1 virus killed 3,045 chickens, and nearly 357,000 more were destroyed in an emergency response.

Xinhua says the local agriculture department has quarantined the infected area.

The government's last reported outbreak was in the northwestern region of Ningxia earlier this month.

Nearly 40 outbreaks of the virus have been reported across the country over the past year.  Nineteen people have been infected, and 12 of them have died.

The World Health Organization says H5N1 has killed at least 132 people worldwide since reappearing in Asia in 2003.

Some information for this report was provided by AP.