Farmscape for July 10, 2017

The Office of Saskatchewan's Chief Veterinary Officer is encouraging the province's pork producers to develop a PED specific response plan and to enforce strict biosecurity protocols among workers and service providers.
Since the end of April over 50 cases of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea have been confirmed in Manitoba.
Dr. Wendy Wilkins, a Disease Surveillance Veterinarian with Saskatchewan Agriculture, says every new case of infection increases the risk of the disease spreading.

Clip-Dr. Wendy Wilkins-Saskatchewan Agriculture:
The swine producers and their service providers are the first line of defense in keeping this virus out of the province simply by making sure of strict biosecurity and be prepared.
If it does happen I think producers would be best served by having a PED specific response plan so that they know in a heartbeat once they get that diagnosis what their next step is.
It's extremely important that every swine producer in this province and their service providers pay strict attention to biosecurity.
Intensive swine production is based on biosecurity.
The best way to keep your herd healthy is to keep diseases out.
In peace time, as some people have called it, there's normal biosecurity but in war time, as in an outbreak situation, you really have to enhance your biosecurity.
That means make sure that there are no breaks in your biosecurity.
It's not O.K. for that truck driver to walk in your barn just this one time.
It's never O.K. just one time.
It's never O.K. to break any of the biosecurity protocols set out by any of the farms.
First thing the farms must do is have that biosecurity protocol.
Then they must know that all their staff and their service providers are aware of that and everybody must adhere to that.

Dr. Wilkins says there's a large number of different risk factors for spreading PEDv so producers have to consider every way the virus can travel and how it can cling to equipment and people to get into the barn.
For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.

       *Farmscape is a presentation of Sask Pork and Manitoba Pork