Middle East ( Europe Brief News): The Swine Health Information Center is closely monitoring Foot and Mouth Disease outbreaks in Europe and the Middle East to assess risks and containment efforts.
According to Dr. Megan Niederwerder, executive director of SHIC, there have been three instances of FMD intrusions into European nations that had long had a bad standing.
“Germany, Slovakia, and Hungary, and we’ve been monitoring that very closely. What is the impact? How have they controlled the disease after introduction? What are the risk factors for those incursions?”
There are outbreaks in Iraq, Kuwait, and Turkey as well, she tells Brownfield at the World Pork Expo in Des Moines.
“Those countries are endemic for Foot and Mouth Disease virus, but when a new serotype (SAT1) is introduced that’s certainly concerning. Something is changing, something is moving.”
According to Niederwerder, FMD is a long-lived aerosol that may travel great distances.
How is SHIC tracking the spread of FMD in Europe and the Middle East?
Official epidemic reports from impacted nations, including Iraq, Bahrain, and Kuwait in the Middle East and Germany, Hungary, and Slovakia in Europe, are tracked by SHIC. They keep note of the dates of official notifications to agencies such as the World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH), laboratory confirmations, and clinical signs.
To exchange timely risk information, coordinate actions, and support vaccination campaigns and biosecurity measures, SHIC collaborates with agencies such as the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and WOAH.
In order to identify transmission pathways and origins, such as the Middle Eastern origin of the German outbreak and East African connections to Middle Eastern outbreaks, SHIC monitors several FMD virus serotypes (such as serotype O in Europe and SAT1 and SAT2 in the Middle East) and their genetic lineages.
