October 13, 2020

Pharmgate Animal Health's PRRSGard swine vaccine now available in the US

Pharmgate Animal Health's PRRSGard swine vaccine, a 1.0 milliliter, single-dose recombinant chimeric vaccine for the Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome virus (PRRSV) is now available for the US market.

The product features an attenuated, lineage 1 PRRSV strain as a vaccine backbone, and A virulent, contemporary lineage 1 PRRSV field isolate, MN 1-8-4. It also includes a non-encoding RNA sequence inserted into the genome. This unique genetic marker allows diagnostic assay differentiation from "wild-type" virus strains.

Pharmgate Animal Health has worked with researchers and customers to test PRRSGard beyond research needed for licensing. Trials show that PRRSGard has low vaccine virus shed and spread, broad cross-strain immunity, and reduced lung lesions and viremia following a challenge. It has been shown to reduce performance loss from pneumonia associated with PRRSV in growing swine.

The PRRS virus costs the U.S. pork industry an estimated US$664 million annually, according to the National Pork Board's "Assessment of the Economic Impact of PRRSV on the US Pork Producer". This figure has been hard to reduce, partly due the continued evolution of PRRSV.

Jeff OKones, Pharmgate Animal Health's technical services veterinarian, said PRRSV continues to be a costly disease and difficult to control in herds, adding that PRRSGard is an innovative new tool created by Pharmgate's product development team for veterinarians and producers to utilize in their herd health protocols to optimise swine performance in the face of PRRSV.

For more information on the PRRSGard vaccine, visit www.prrsgard.com.

-      Reuters