December 10, 2007

 

Animal diseases with big economic impact the focus of USAHA meeting

 

 

The 2007 joint scientific session of the US Animal Health Association and the American Association of Veterinary Laboratory Diagnosticians (AAVLD) focused on diseases that have hit the industry hardest this year.

 

These dieases included porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS), salmonella infections in poultry, viral hemorrhagic septicemia in fish, scrapie, bovine viral diarrhea, and Johne's disease, all of which were presented in the sessions.

 

This year's focus is to look at how the organizations can positively impact economically significant diseases for food animal producers, said Jim Leafstedt, the 2007-2008 USAHA president.

 

USAHA and AAVLD have long been involved in many aspects of disease prevention, control, and eradication, across multiple species, he added.

 

The four key areas addressed during the session were an overview of the science in dealing with the noted diseases; development of solutions to mitigate or eliminate diseases; factors that could be limiting progress and roles the USAHA and AAVLD can fill in the development of programmes for prevention, control, and eradication of the diseases.

 

The Committee on Animal Emergency Management called for a comprehensive effort by government and industry to create a funding system that will provide the resources for state animal health agencies to reach the amounts needed to protect livestock from disease outbreaks and other hazards.

 

The Committee on Animal Health Information Systems discussed development of national surveillance systems.

 

Other AAHA committees which made recommendations include the Committee on Aquaculture, which issued a call for a national surveillance programme for viral hemorrhagic septicemia. The committee reports that such a surveillance program would help determine which fish species were infected with VHS as well as the geographic distribution of the disease.

 

The Committee on Feed Safety and the Committee on Food Safety held a joint session to discuss lessons learned from the melamine and cyanuric acid contamination that caused a pet food recall in spring 2007.

 

An upcoming bluetongue survey was outlined at the Committee on Bluetongue and Bovine Retroviruses meeting. The survey will be conducted by the Southeastern Cooperative Wildlife Disease Study to determine the species of Culicoides midge in Florida.