#13,469
While the arrival of African Swine Fever to China earlier this month - followed by 3 more outbreaks - has been the big ASF story of late, the virus continues to spread widely through Eastern Europe as well.
Yesterday the OIE reported 23 new outbreaks (since Aug 2nd) in Romania, which will require the culling of more than 170,000 pigs.Three of those outbreaks occurred on the 2nd largest pig farm in Europe, located in Tufesti, Braila.
While the OIE lists the source of this outbreak as `unknown or inconclusive', a report appearing two days ago in Pig's Progress (ASF on Romania’s largest pig farm: 140,000 pigs culled) suggests some smallholders in the region may have been dumping dead pigs into the river, and the virus has infected downstream farms drawing water from the Danube.
Whatever the cause, since it first arrived from Africa in 2007, ASF has been spreading inexorably across Eastern Europe and Russia, often aided and abetted by poor farm biosecurity and sometimes by the illegal sale and transport of swine or pork products.While Western Europe remains unscathed by these outbreaks, they remain wary, knowing how easily the virus could be imported in their direction.
The UK's DEFRA has released a new update (written before the latest Romania Outbreak), which details ASF's geographic expansion, including some recent yet-to-be-explained large leaps in Romania and a trend towards larger commercial farms being struck in places like Russia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine.
Much like we saw in Sunday's report (see South Korea Detects ASF Gene In Chinese Food Products: Additional Testing Underway), the authors warn of the dangers of travelers returning from ASF endemic areas carrying contaminated food items.I've only included some excerpts from a larger report, so follow the link to read it in its entirety.
Updated Outbreak Assessment #16(SNIP)
African Swine fever in Eastern Europe
23 August 2018
Ref: VITT/1200 ASF in Eastern Europe
Disease report
Since our last update on 25 th June 2018, cases of African Swine Fever (ASF) have continued to be reported in wild boar and outbreaks in domestic pigs in Eastern Europe and western Eurasia (see map). While ASF has not moved substantially westward across Europe since the reports in wild boar in the Czech Republic in June 2017, outbreaks in backyard pigs in Romania have increased exponentially and the disease has recently jumped west within Romania, likely from the south-east part of the country near the border with Ukraine and there are now 9 regions reporting outbreaks in backyard domestic pigs (Bihor, Braila, Calarasi, Constanta, Galati, Ialomita, Ilfov, Satu Mare and Tulcea).
In addition outbreaks have occurred in pig farms in northern Poland along the border with Kaliningrad. During July and August, ASF outbreaks have been reported in some large pig farms (>1,000 pigs) particularly in the northern parts of Eastern Europe (non-EU and EU).
Table. Numbers of outbreaks in domestic pigs (i.e. backyard and commercial) in July andAugust 2018
Situation assessment(Continue . . . )
ASF is continuing to spread within Eastern Europe, although there is no evidence of spread westwards in the EU. There are two trends observed which are cause for concern.
First is the spread and number of outbreaks in the large non-commercial backyard pig sector in Romania; the latest reports indicate a large jump into Ilfov county some 200 km west of Tulcea county where the number of cases in non-commercial backyard pigs has increased exponentially. Understanding how disease is spreading so rapidly in the backyard sector in the area is vital to designing effective control measures.
The second is the increase in outbreaks in large commercial pig farms (>1,000 pigs) in countries including Russia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine. An outbreak of ASF has also been reported in late July for the first time in a large pig farm (>1,000 pigs) along the northern border of Poland near the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, therefore controls on the commercial production of pork products will rely heavily on effective ante and post mortem inspections.
Some 95,000 kg of total pork meat has been legally imported to the UK in 2018 to date from Romania and a similar amount from Poland (HMRC Trade Stats). Commercially produced meat from the ASF-affected regions cannot be traded as fresh or frozen meat to other member states.
However there are concerns around ASF-contaminated or infected pork products from non-EU countries entering the EU in passenger luggage and then being discarded in areas where wild boar or outdoor pigs are present. Publicity campaigns are in place to discourage EU nationals from bringing pork products into UK, but keepers should also be aware of this high risk activity.
Conclusion
The risk of ASF introduction to the UK was previously raised to “low” in August 2017. This was because despite the relatively low level of legal trade in live pigs or commercially produced pig products, there could be a risk from the fomite pathway involving movement of people and vehicles from affected Eastern EU countries and the evidence around the findings of contaminated / infected non-EU origin pig products detected in the EU (according to presentations by Hungary and Slovakia at PAFF this year).
This risk is showing no sign of decreasing, and it is vital that visitors to the EU Member States understand the impact of bringing personal food items which are discarded for wildlife to pick up. Similarly, visitors to affected areas that have any contact with the environment around wild boar cases should be vigilant about cleaning and disinfecting any vehicles, clothing, footwear or equipment, including hunting equipment, which may be contaminated. Hunters visiting affected areas should not bring back “trophies” as these could be contaminated.
The current risk of ASF introduction to the UK is therefore still considered to be “low”, although the situation is being kept under review.
We would like to highlight to all pig keepers and the public to ensure pigs are not fed catering waste, kitchen scraps or pork products, thereby observing the swill feeding ban.
All pig keepers should be aware that visitors to their premises should not have had recent contact with affected regions. Anybody returning from the affected EU MSs should avoid contact with domestic pigs, whether commercial holdings or smallholdings, areas with feral pigs or wild boar, until they are confident they have no contaminated clothing, footwear or equipment. Pig keepers and veterinarians should remind themselves of the clinical signs for ASF, which may not always be immediately obvious, as this virus appears to have reduced pathogenicity according to some disease reports. Any suspect cases must be reported promptly.
