Articles - Pig health

There are 3 potential options to stabilize BTW herds following an outbreak that have all proven successful over time. They have very different cost and risk profiles and a through economic assessment is needed to determine what the best course of action is for each new outbreak.

This case describes an acute outbreak of gastric ulcers in pigs of 30-40 kg live weight that affected 38 farms throughout a year and that presented mortalities from a 5% up to a 40% depending on the severity of the cases.

This study, based on some 120,000 sows, quantifies the reduction of the risk of introducing PRRS viruses when using air filtering.

After the banning of antibiotics as growth promoters, there was an increase in their total consumption due to the therapeutics treatments...

The European Commission is reviewing and consulting how antimicrobials are used in veterinary medicine following the release of their 12 point programme in 2011. Present and future situation of antimicrobial use in the European Community is analysed.

How do we determine clinical significance? One way is to evaluate how many individuals need to be treated in order to obtain one more favorable outcome. This is the concept behind Number Needed to Treat (NNT).

It was developed in USA as a way to improve communication of what needed to be done to improve the chances of success in stabilizing and managing breeding herds.

The pig farm management team in charge of the post-weaned piglet nursery areas on these wean-to-finish sites has found serious problems with diarrhoea in recent batches of piglets arriving from the breeding farms.

Interventions can only reduce but not eradicate Salmonella from the herd. This emphasises the importance of trying to avoid introduction especially Salmonella Typhimurium or Salmonella Derby.

EFSA estimates that, across the EU, up to 27% of human Salmonellosis cases may be attributed to pig meat.

In July 2010 a severe respiratory disease occurred in the farm: coughing in gilts, and coughing and depression in fatteners concomitantly to an increase of the mean stillborn and mummified piglet rate in a batch of sows.

In this article Salmonella critical contamination points in the abattoir will be analyzed, as well as the measures that can be taken with regard to them.

The risk of contamination by Salmonella increases along the food chain, reaching its maximum in the abattoir. So, the abattoir is one of the points in which the actions carried out can be most effective.

A summary of current knowledge to address frequently asked questions from producers and practitioners on PCV2-associated reproductive disease.

The “normal” sporadic and unexplained abortion rate in pigs is approximately 1 to 2 % of pigs that are mated and achieve a pregnancy.

When exposed, the pigs get infected in less time than the length of the transportation and the waiting period (prior to the slaughter) in the abattoir.

Two species of Brachyspira are well-recognized pathogens of pigs: B pilosicoli and B. hyodysenteriae. Recently, dysentery-like disease has been reported in association with infection by strongly beta-hemolytic spirochetes which are not identified as B. hyodysenteriae.

It is very important to establish a series of preventive measures to prevent a worsening health status with the introduction of new serotypes.

Given the high prevalence of the infection due to the PCV2 and its presence in healthy and sick animals, the serological tests against this pathogen have been questioned as a diagnostic test.

The farms can be free from PRRS, enzootic pneumonia, atrophic rhinitis, pleuropneumonia, scabies, swine dysentery, and so on. However, why is it we are still unable to characterize farms as Salmonella-free?

75% of slaughtered pigs had their livers discarded due to lesions characteristic of parasitic migration.

The thermographic cameras can measure the temperature in all the image with resolutions that are equivalent to 19,200 infrared thermometers at the same time.

This chapter is intended as a roadmap for the development of a Salmonella control program for factories, a program whose aim should be to minimize Salmonella contamination, of any and all serotypes.