African Swine Fever on the border of Moscow Region

19-01-2012 | Home | News

Another outbreak of African Swine Fever (ASF) has been discovered in the Tver region. According to representatives of the veterinary services of the region – near the border of the Moscow region a few dead wild boars have been found.

The dead animal has been found near the village of Lesnoi of Torzhok district, Tver region, which has in total about 1,000 pigs.

Experts of the Tver Interregional Veterinary Laboratory analysed samples taken from the carcasses of the dead boars. The analysis gave a positive result: the animals died due to the African swine fever virus. Veterinary services has called on animals being quarantined in the Torzhok district, also special actions for the rescue of animals from the private households in the quarantine zone has taken place.

As stated the representatives of Rosselkhoznadzor, judging by the tracks of the infected animals, there could still be about half a dozen of wild boars which may migrate towards the Moscow region. The Moscow region is among the leaders among the Russian states in terms of pork production, there are a concentrated number of large pig farms.

Rosselkhoznadzor experts also recommended that the owners of all pork production enterprises take extra precautions, in particular to limit outside access to the facility, as well as limit vehicles that have not had a pre-disinfected treatment. They are also recommending to transfer production process to a close operation mode.

The Tver region until last summer was completely free of ASF – but since June there were six reported outbreaks of the virus in the region, which completely destroyed the 16 pig farms, including 4 large pig complexes, resulting in a total of 20 thousand pigs being culled.

(By Vladislav Vorotnikov)