Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus has hit large commercial hog
farms in the Ukraine and might spread across Europe to claim 25 to 30 million
piglets, warns a veterinarian.
A report prepared by Alexander Tarassevych, who
works for the United States Foreign Agriculture Services out of an office in
Kiev, quotes international veterinarian consultant Dr. John Carr, who spent 10
days in November in Ukraine visiting three farms with PEDV outbreaks.
Carr is considered a global expert on PEDV. He
said as many as 10,000 pigs were lost in just four days at the farms he
visited, noting that bigger farms would have bigger problems.
A spread to pork-producing countries such as
Poland could cause “a major production decrease in 2015,” the FAS report noted.
Controlling the outbreak in the Ukraine is
challenging because about half of the country’s pork production comes from
small back-yard pens.
Carr “suspects this is the beginning of the
European outbreak,” and estimates that the virus will kill 25 to 35 million
pigs over the next 18 months.
He said the impact of Ukraine’s outbreaks is
more serious than what he witnessed in Asia.
