Liberia has reported an outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza on a poultry farm, the World Organisation for Animal Health said on Friday.

The disease, commonly called bird flu, has spread around the globe in the past years, leading to the culling of hundreds of millions of poultry.

The outbreak, detected in February on a farm in the Bong County, killed 18 birds out of a flock of 26,000, the Paris-based WOAH said, quoting information from Liberian authorities.

Some 25,800 poultry in the Western African flock were vaccinated, the report also said, without specifying when vaccination occurred.