Some people in the hog industry are relaxing a mite while others keep pushing for heightened and even more stringent bio-security protocols as farms keep breaking out in the United States and things remain stable across Canada.
Dr. Chris Byra, the manager of the Canadian Swine Health Intelligence Network says with the exception of one new case reported in June, the PED status in Canada remains stable.
With the exception of that one new case in a farrow to finish farm in Perth County, Ontario, no new breakouts reported in Canada since then.
In Ontario, the Ontario Swine Health Advisory Board and Southwest Ontario Veterinary Services held a PED summit recently where they discussed efforts to eliminate the virus.
Dr. Byra says because the virus is less viable in warmer weather, there’s the opportunity to begin the elimination programs in Ontario.
“They’ve expanded their ARC and E programs, the area regional control and elimination programs, initially organized for PRRS to include PED,” he said. “And these groups then disclose their health status to all the others in the group and they discuss what’s working, what isn’t and they use the group as a means to build support for the on-farm changes to get rid of the disease.”
Industry people discussed herds on the way to eliminating the disease, and those that have at this summit.
“Some of the nursery and finisher barns are already free of PED at this point and many of the farms, particularly from this one veterinary practice, almost all the farms are now a part of these elimination programs,” said Byra. “This is the time of year that it’s easier to do because the virus doesn’t survive well once it’s dry and warm. Once it’s cold, it becomes more difficult to succeed. The goal is to have these farms free of it by October. In the winter this organism is more active and certainly can survive much longer in the environment so that’s when we tend to start seeing more cases of it.”
Dr. Byra says American systems have eliminated the virus in almost all cases but he warns it doesn’t take much of an error in disinfection to allow the virus to survive and re-infect so doing a very good job is crucial.
The CSHIN manager is hopeful Canada can eliminate PED from the swine herd especially with the working plan in Ontario with farmers’ backing and support creating some optimism amongst the industry thinking they can win the battle.
Dr. Byra says Quebec receives approximately 15 thousand pigs a week from Ontario and so far only one case of PED on farm.
“The probability of eradicating the virus in the U.S. is low because there is so much contamination but in Canada producers are doing a good job preventing new infections so there is a chance we can eradicate the virus,” he adds.•
— By Harry Siemens
