And as we continue our coverage at the NAFB convention in Kansas City, Missouri, we are pleased to talk now with our friends at the Swine Health Information Center. Dr. Lisa Becton is with us from SHIC.
Q: Well, we have a few different topics to catch up on, and I want to talk just overall emerging diseases and more in a minute. But let’s start with some of the recent news from SHIC. I know that you guys, along with the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research and the Pork Checkoff, have released an RFP looking for H5N1 risk to swine research, things of that nature. Walk us through what we’re seeing here right now.
LB: This collaborative effort has been a great opportunity for us to pool our collective thoughts and funds together. And so, like you mentioned, it’s a collaboration between SHIC, Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research and the National Pork Board. And the RFP is H5N1 risk to swine.
You know, we’ve been obviously watching what’s going on in the dairy, and so there’s been a lot of questions come up in the swine sector of what does this virus mean for swine? What does this look like? What are the impacts? Can we detect it currently, and can we detect it accurately? And so as we were progressing through this year spring into summer, we all realized that this is a need for the industry, and it fits in line with SHIC’s mission to help protect and mitigate emerging diseases.
And so we put this together. It’s a $4 million effort. RFP is live at the SHIC website at swinehealth.org and then we’re requesting proposals through December of this year.
Q: Well, and you mentioned, of course, monitoring H5N1. I think that’s so important right now. We did see that confirmed case at a backyard farm in Oregon but felt very isolated. But just with the way that this has all changed from birds to dairy, now seeing it in swine, we do realize that H5N1 is an issue. And that’s part of the reason why I’m sure research is ongoing from you guys to kind of looking at how this evolution is going and how we can prevent the spread, right?
LB: Yes, that’s right. You know, as we look at emerging diseases, some of the definition of an emerging disease is has it changed in a species that we don’t normally see? So even though we have influenza viruses, and swine H5N1 had not been found in.
And now with the first case, it really again continues to raise our awareness and the need to have that critical research to be able to identify it and be able to prepare to prevent it, but also to respond should the case ever happen in a commercial operation. And so that’s really what was the push and the premise for a lot of the research proposal.
Q: Another great thing you guys are doing, the Wean to Harvest program. Can you give us an update there?
LB: That’s been a really excellent program that started years ago. And the goal was to try to address biosecurity in our wean to harvest market. So grow finished pigs, nursery pigs, because traditionally we haven’t had a whole lot of focus in that area because pigs go in and then they eventually go out to market.
But we also realized that sector can impact backflow into sow units because of transportation of people, et cetera. And so we started the research program and have had 20 projects funded to date. And now we’re starting to see those projects mature and we’re getting information back out to producers.
And a lot of different meetings we’ve all been at, we’ve had producers go and present on their information, but looking at different things, really trying to work on transportation, look at how do we improve things on farms. So, for example, we looked at manure management. How can manure management and application impact swine health? So a lot of really practical applications are coming out of this research program.
Q: Well, thinking about just emerging diseases in general, that all kind of ties in with the work you guys do at SHIC. You know, we mentioned H5N1, but obviously African Swine Fever is another worldwide issue, not in the US yet, thankfully. And we’ve been saying that for the last several years. I think about that, JEV, PRRS. So many different emerging diseases out there. Any updates on any of those for us?
LB: We do a couple of different things at SHIC.
We do domestic disease monitoring through our swine disease reporting system. And that’s a collaboration with six different veterinary diagnostic labs that cover about 96% of all of our swine cases. So that really looks at what’s happening in the US and so we know diseases like PRRS are still at the forefront and cause a lot of issues. But we’re also monitoring influenzas and PED. And so those diseases are still present, still a challenge. And so we’re continuing to monitor and look at those.
But then on the global disease sector, ASF continues to be the biggest bear out there. And so that’s continuously being monitored. One of the issues that’s come up recently is that there’s been a change in the genotypes. And so the two different genotypes, genotype 1 and 2, genotype 2 is what has been causing more problems.
But we’ve noticed in China and now in Russia a combination of those two different genotypes to create a new virus.And so that’s raising eyebrows of what does this mean for our current mitigations? What does this virus look like in pigs? Will it move quickly through the world? We don’t know. And so that’s what also facilitates looking and continuing to monitor what’s happening in changes.
Q: And I think as well, just to kind of a good end note for us is it comes back to biosecurity on our farms and good biosecurity on our operations is one of the best ways to stop the spread of any of these emerging diseases, right?
LB: It sure is. You know, because I look at it, this is something that producers can do immediately. It’s not something that we have to wait for, get new equipment or techniques. It’s application of sound biosecurity principles for disease prevention for any disease, whether it’s emerging and endemic or even foreign animal disease. So, yes, that is a cornerstone of a lot of our health prevention.
Listen to the interview in Segment Four of AOA 12-2-2024 episode:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/aoa-12-2-2024/id1356247010?i=1000678950520
