Manitoba’s Chief Veterinary Officer says quick action in identifying the province’s latest case of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea will help limit any potential for neighboring farms to become infected.
On Tuesday Manitoba’s 11th case of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea was confirmed on a sow operation in southeast Manitoba.
Dr. Megan Bergman, Manitoba’s Chief Veterinary Officer, says action has been taken to contain the infection and efforts are underway to identify its source.
This particular response was very quick. We had some very astute veterinarians and staff in the barn that caught this quite early and we were able to get control in place in terms of biosecurity and biocontainment on that farm very quickly as well as initiate some trace activity with respect to understanding what has been on and off the farm both with respect to equipment, animals and people.
We’re in the process of conducting surveillance testing of any in contact farms that may have had some indirect contact with this particular site as well as following up on any potential linkages that may help us identify where the introduction may have occurred.
At this point the barn certainly is working its way through the virus and, once the animals begin to recover, then they can undertake their cleaning and disinfection process. Once that that occurs then we initiate a surveillance program within that barn to try to identify when the barn has achieved negative status.
In addition we have also conducted surveillance of all farms that are within five kilometers of this site to help us ensure that we haven’t seen any potential transmission. That’s underway as well and we’re very close to having the initial round of those tests completed.
~ Dr. Megan Bergman, Manitoba Agriculture
Dr. Bergman says the infected farm has implemented biocontainment, which means they’re making sure they’re maintaining very good biosecurity on entry and when they’re existing the barn so they don’t bring the virus out with them and farms in the area have been encouraged to enhance their biosecurity practices as well. She says with good surveillance and strong biosecurity practices the risk of transmission should be limited.
