Farmscape for September 1, 2023

The Manager of the Canada West Swine Health Intelligence Network reports Streptococcus zooepidemicus is proving to be very difficult to control without depopulation.
The typical sign of Streptococcus zooepidemicus, a bacterial infection first identified as causing disease in pigs in 2019, is sudden death in mature animals.
An outbreak of Strep zoo in Alberta is among the topics covered as part of the Canada West Swine Health Intelligence Network's just released swine health surveillance report for the second quarter of 2023.
CWSHIN Manager Dr. Jette Christensen says it's been present on a few farms in Canada in two production flows since 2019 with devastating effects and it's currently present on one farm in Alberta.

Quote-Dr. Jette Christensen-Canada West Swine Health Intelligence Network:
It was diagnosed in late September of last year.
This herd is a five thousand sow unit and they have been trying to control the disease since the first outbreak.
It's a devastating disease.
It's causing high mortality in mature animals.
It's really sudden death.
Sows start to get depressed, go off feed and within 12 hours they're dead.
It's a very dramatic disease.
They've had huge mortality losses.
They've tried different options but now it’s trickled downstream and there's been two farrowing sites in that same system where they've had mortality.
Now, they've given up on controlling it so now they're going to pursue a depopulation of the  affected sites and try to repopulate again to try to get rid of the disease because they can't live with it.
It's a bacterial disease that is really hard to control without depopulation.

Dr. Christensen notes both affected production flows have opted to pursue depopulation-repopulation to control the disease.
She says if you see sudden death in mature animals, call your herd practitioner.
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Bruce Cochrane.

       *Farmscape is produced on behalf of North America’s pork producers