African Swine Fever – Page 5 – Swine in Minnesota

Evaluation of oral fluid as an aggregate sample for early detection of ASF

This is our Friday rubric: every week a new Science Page from the Bob Morrison’s Swine Health Monitoring Project. The previous editions of the science page are available on our website.

Since ASF has been found in the Dominic Republic last week, swine producers are concerned about it spreading into the United States. Early detection would be essential to ensure a rapid response and containment of the disease. This week, the MSHMP team shares the summary of a Canadian study looking at using oral fluids as a tool to diagnose ASF.

Key Points

Oral fluid samples may be used as a low labor, cost effective alternative sample source for rapid detection of ASFV during ASF surveillance.
ASFv genome was detected in oral fluids at low-to-moderate levels as early as 3-5 days post infection, before clinical symptoms started.
Further research is needed to understand limitations and best practices of oral fluid sampling for ASFv

ASF has been reported in the Dominican Republic after 40 years since the last outbreak

This is a report from the Swine Health Information Center in collaboration with the Swine Disease Global Surveillance team at the University of Minnesota.

On July 28, 2021, the Ministry of Agriculture of the Dominican Republic confirmed the presence of African swine fever (ASF) after learning the results of tests on 389 samples collected from pigs raised on farms and in backyards sent to the USDA – Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory (Plum Island) through an existing cooperative surveillance program.

Ability of different matrices to transmit African swine fever virus – Part 2

This is our Friday rubric: every week a new Science Page from the Bob Morrison’s Swine Health Monitoring Project. The previous editions of the science page are available on our website.

For this week we continue with the summarized results from the Panel on Animal Health and Welfare (AHAW) of the European Food Safety Authority’s (EFSA) published opinion on the risk of African Swine Fever virus entering into non-affected areas of the EU. Several components were modeled as part of the overall modeling of the relative risk of ASF entering a non-affected area of the EU. Last week’s science page covered the first component, the Likelihood that a single farm delivery of a product will contain a dose of infectious ASFV, which is large enough to cause an infection in at least one pig on the farm (‘q’). In this follow up page we will look at the last two modeled components of the risk assessment.

Ability of different matrices to transmit African swine fever virus

This is our Friday rubric: every week a new Science Page from the Bob Morrison’s Swine Health Monitoring Project. The previous editions of the science page are available on our website.

This week, the MSHMP team summarized a report from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) regarding African Swine Fever transmission through fomites.

Are mosquitoes a risk for ASF?

This is our Friday rubric: every week a new Science Page from the Bob Morrison’s Swine Health Monitoring Project. The previous editions of the science page are available on our website.

This week, the MSHMP tip summarized a publication by Qin et al. regarding the risk of mosquitoes carrying and transmitting African Swine Fever virus.

Key Points

African swine fever (ASF) continues to pose a large risk in the absence of safe and effective ASF vaccines
There is evidence indicating that mosquitos may be a possible ASF vector
Mosquitos captured at ASF positive farms had DNA extracted and tested for ASF with no positive results