Industry Organizations Discuss National Bio-surveillance System for US Swine Industry

April 19, 2017 — Paul Sundberg

Last week, the Swine Health Information Center (SHIC) joined the Institute for Infectious Animal Diseases (IIAD), a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Center of Excellence, and the National Pork Board (NPB) to host a workshop to discuss and build upon industry and government efforts identifying and developing a road map to address gaps for a nationally coordinated bio-surveillance system. In addition to the hosts, participants included pork producers, swine veterinarians, IIAD, DHS, American Association of Swine Veterinarians, National Pork Producers Council, as well as state and federal animal health officials. The workshop also received sponsorship from the DHS Science and Technology Directorate.

Workshop Objectives

• Identify gaps, tools, and research needs for a workable, credible, affordable, and robust national bio-surveillance system supporting coordinated early detection, rapid response and efficient control of foreign animal diseases (FADs), and enables improved prevention of FADs and emerging/re-emerging priority diseases to the US swine industry
• Develop a road map to address gaps, barriers, and research needs (identified in Objective 1) for improvement and implementation of the sustainable successfully functioning, national, rapid bio-surveillance system meeting the needs of the US swine industry as well as state and federal animal health authorities.

There was a significant consensus among industry stakeholders participating in the workshop regarding the attributes of an optimal risk-based comprehensive disease preparedness system and belief a modern robust national bio-surveillance system is a vital component. Go to the SHIC website, or the National Pork Board website for the list of the attributes and the priority action items that the group developed.

Among all participants there was a commitment to timely forward progress. "Though we have a good consensus among our stakeholders, we have to work on these action items with a sense of urgency - including developing a timeline for completion of activities," said Dr. Paul Sundberg, SHIC executive director.

The United States Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (USDA APHIS) currently has regulatory surveillance programs (pseudorabies, brucellosis and classical swine fever), monitors for influenza and vesicular diseases and is in the process of evaluating the parameters to develop a comprehensive US swine surveillance program. Additionally, the US swine industry actively monitors for swine diseases in a continual effort to protect the health and welfare of the country's swine herd.

Swine health and food safety is of paramount importance ¬- the industry has more than 60,000 pork producers who annually market more than 110 million hogs, equaling total gross receipts of $23.4 billion, supports 550,000 jobs, and contributes $39 billion to the U.S. Gross Domestic Product. With record industry expansion in recent years, pork production exports have risen to more than 26 percent of US production - a number that is expected to continue to increase. With an ever-expanding industry, diseases that can disrupt trade and commerce are of increasing concern, making adapting the nation's current surveillance system to keep up with the industry's needs and speed of commerce of upmost importance.

The mission of the Swine Health Information Center is to protect and enhance the health of the United States swine herd through coordinated global disease monitoring, targeted research investments that minimize the impact of future disease threats, and analysis of swine health data. For more information, visit http://www.swinehealth.org or contact Dr. Paul Sundberg at psundberg@swinehealth.org.

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Paul Sundberg, NPB, VP Science & Technology