December 14, 2020

Saxony, Germany links up with fence as part of efforts to prevent ASF entry from Poland

Eastern German state Saxony has connected to a fence in Brandenburg early this month during the construction of a permanent, wild boar-proof game protection fence along the border with Poland.

The border fence is an important measure to control African swine fever (ASF) in Germany and is currently being built along the entire German-Polish border.

In the Free State of Saxony, the number of cases of ASF has increased to 15.

In addition to the first case of an animal killed by a hunter on October 27, seven carcasses or parts of carcasses infected with ASF were found in the subsequent search for fallen wild boar.

Now, after another selective fallen game search, seven more cases were added. The samples found to be infected by the State Research Institute were confirmed by the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute, the German reference laboratory.

The new discoveries of dead and infected animals were all detected near the Neisse river within the at-risk area. In total, the search teams found around 70 carcasses.

The combined, total number of ASF cases in Brandenburg (183 confirmed cases) and Saxony was 198.

- Sachsen (Germany)