Residents in Shanghai, China were deeply disturbed to find their Huangpu River being used as the dumping ground for dead pigs, reported The New York Times.
Officers were scrambling to restrict the illegal trading of pig parts, after 2,800 carcasses that potentially came from Jiaxing city and floated into Shanghai.
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"This is the water we are drinking," said Huang Beibei, a Shanghai local who was first at the scene to take photos and post them on his blog Thursday reported CBS News. "What is the government doing to address this?"
Authorities took a water sample of the river and found it tested positive for porcine circovirus, a virus that infects pigs but doesn't spread to humans, according to Chinese state news agency Xinhua, The Times reported.
"So far, water quality has not been affected, but we have to remove the pigs as quickly as possible and can't let their bodies rot in the water," said Xu Rong, the director of Shanghai's Songjiang District Environmental Protection Bureau, in an interview with Global Times.
According to the Agriculture Committee in Shanghai, officials have not found the cause behind the pig deaths however, a fat disease, linked with porcine circovirus, has been detected in one pig carcass.
Since Friday, officers arrived to remove rotten pigs out of the water, some missing internal organs, reported The Huffington Post.
"Well, since there supposedly is no problem in drinking this water, please forward this message, if you agree, to ask Shanghai's party secretary, mayor and water authority leaders if they will be the first ones to drink this meat soup?" lawyer Gan Yuanchun said on his verified microblog.
Pig dumping has risen since police marketed to crackdown on illegal selling of sick pigs and villagers have bred thousands that have to be burned or buried, however there's not enough land.
Authorities already reported Monday that the carcasses reached 2,813 adult and piglets.
