Confidence Boosted in Efforts to Gain Control of PRRS

CANADA - A south-western Ontario-based swine veterinarian says improved biosecurity and better tools for diagnosing and controlling PRRS are fueling a greater level of optimism among pork producers in the industry's ability to control the disease, Bruce Cochrane writes.

26 January 2011

3 minute read

North America

Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome is a viral infection that causes an estimated 130 million dollars in losses to the Canadian swine industry annually.

Dr Doug Mac Dougald, a partner with Southwest Ontario Veterinary Services, says PRRS has affected the North American pig industry for over 20 years and is very prevalent in Quebec and Ontario and significantly less prevalent in western Canada.

Dr Doug Mac Dougald-Southwest Ontario Veterinary Services

There's a formal PRRS area regional control elimination programme in Ontario in the Niagara Peninsula.

That's the first main area project.

There's many other projects underway in different parts of the country on studying air filtration to keep virus out of the barns, to look at transport, biosecurity initiatives, disease certification projects and all are important to provide information on implementing more area control programmes or plans across Canada.

I think the focus on PRRS control and elimination today is driven by the lack of success of controlling it over 20 years, the continued economic devastation that the disease causes and the fact that we've got better tools today, better understanding of the disease, better diagnostics and better biosecurity procedures to allow us to move toward control and in some cases elimination on a regional basis.

Dr Mac Dougald says PRRS virus elimination is very successful on a herd basis.

He says we've been eliminating PRRS virus on a site by site basis for many years and have a very high success rate but we are still early on in the regional initiatives.