An Alberta based swine veterinarian reports tremendous progress has been made this summer throughout North America in the effort to contain and eliminate the virus responsible for Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea.
Although there is no question Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea has become endemic in the U.S. with an estimated 50 percent of the U.S. sow herd positive for a number of strains, including three strains of PED and one of Delta Coronavirus, the number of new reported cases continued to decline through the summer.
Dr. Egan Brockhoff, with Prairie Swine Health Services, told Alberta Pork’s monthly PED update Friday, there’s a lot of positive news to report on the PED front throughout North America.
The number of cases being reported throughout the U.S. continued to decline and they declined in a nice steady way. In Canada, we have our positive herd in Prince Edward Island appears now to be negative for the virus, no long shedding and open and free to move pigs again. Quebec has done an excellent job with their sites. They had 16 sites. 11 of their 16 sites are now negative.
Canada, of course, also has more than one strain of PEDv virus and, as we’ve looked at the eradication programs in Quebec, they found multiple strains present in just those few sites, so it’s great to see that they’re doing such a fantastic job removing virus from Quebec. Ontario also doing an extremely good job this summer removing virus and decreasing the number of infected premises across the province. Then finally, as we get to Manitoba, Manitoba is also moving towards a day where they are very close to being PED negative on all sites.
Dr. Brockhoff notes, if we look at some of the recent veterinary conferences, a lot of the U.S. systems are reporting success in eradicating the virus, and that’s really good news.
