African Swine Fever: A Threat You Can't Ignore

African swine fever (ASF) is a threat to the U.S. pork industry that Dr. Daniel Hendrickson, DVM, takes very seriously. Hendrickson owns Stoney Creek Veterinary Service in Farmland, Ind., a part of Four Star Veterinary Service.

He believes that the United States is taking great strides to keep the ASF virus out, from border protection to feed companies closely monitoring where they source their ingredients.

“If we do get it in the U.S., I feel that we are in a very good place because of what we learned from PEDV,” he said. “In Indiana, the experiences we have had with highly pathogenic avian influenza and how that virus was dealt with, from quarantine zones to how they eliminated the virus, has prepared us to combat ASF if we do get it here.”

He encourages pork producers to make sure their premise ID is correct and to doublecheck that the premise ID is for the actual physical address of where those pigs are located.

“If a foreign animal disease gets into the U.S. or another disease flares up and gets more severe in the U.S., this is how they will be able to track disease and track where those animals were located and where they came from. That is going to give us the biggest success to be able to shut down any disease, quarantine it and eradicate it from the U.S.,” Hendrickson said.