CALF_News_December_2019_January_2020

19 CALF News • December 2019 | January 2020 • www.calfnews.net INNOVATION blood clotting mechanism is responsible for organ damage as well as hyperemia, a condition that causes a swine’s ears, abdomen, tail and lower legs to turn a vivid, purplish red. Other symptoms include abortion, loss of appetite, recumbency (down and unable to get up), respiratory distress, vomiting and bleeding from the nose and rectum. Mortality reaches nearly 100 percent in 5-7 days. Many of our readership will recall hearing about a hog cholera (now called “swine fever”) epidemic early in the 20th century, decimating the U.S. hog population. Suffering through continual cholera outbreaks in the 1800s, a final U.S. epidemic took place in 1913. By this time, the scientific community had discovered microbes and moved our medical knowledge into the modern era. The result was identification of the hog cholera virus, containment and eutha- nization of 10 percent of our country’s hog population. Resulting carcasses were first burned, then buried. Here’s the bottom line: ASF cannot be differentiated from hog cholera by either clinical or postmortem examina- tion. Extensive lab work is necessary to determine which disease is present. I can only say you’ll understand the process if you have a PhD. We are talking about some serious stuff There is no treatment for ASF, and no vaccines are currently available. Any swine surviving infection becomes persistently infected, adding to the likeli- hood of spreading the disease. Preven- tative measures are the only means of steering clear of the pestilence. Since direct animal contact is another sure-fire mode of transmission, farms in areas where wild boar live, especially Czechoslovakia, are constructing what they call “odor fences,” keeping wild boar away from hog farms with perimeter fencing to keep the wild game a safe distance away. An interesting side note indicates that the ASF virus made its major appearance outside Africa at about the same time as the emergence of AIDS. Wikipedia reports that ASF was highly suspected of causing AIDS until the realization that it was brought about by the HIV virus. What about us? Authorities warn that it is not a matter of if we contract ASF in our country, but when . How this may come about is not dif- ficult to envision. Contaminated meat has already been confiscated at an airport from a flight arriving from out of the US. The virus may be carried in on clothing, equipment or shoes; the hardiness of this microbe will contribute to the likelihood that it can happen. Above all, pork pro- ducers must engage in effective protocol, they are the last line of defense. Beef cattle producers can take a grave lesson from the potential disaster facing our pork industry. We are not immune to similar circumstances. In the end, “critters are critters,” as one of my old veterinarian friends used to say, and they are all subject to disease of some sort. Our livestock are all part of the produc- tion of protein that feeds the world. 