The USDA will move quickly to eradicate the African swine fever if the viral disease is discovered in the United States, said Agriculture Undersecretary Greg Ibach at the National Pork Industry Forum in Kansas City. The USDA would order a 72-hour nationwide “standstill” of hog shipments, as a step to prevent spread of the virus, and it would kill all infected and exposed hogs, potentially thousands of animals or more.
African swine fever is harmless to humans but kills almost all of the hogs it infects. An epidemic last year in China decimated herds in the world’s largest pork producer and consumer. The virus has spread to other Asian countries and also is in eastern Europe. There are more than 77 million hogs in the United States.
“First and foremost, USDA is committed to doing all it can to prevent ASF from entering the United States,” said Ibach on Friday as he announced additional measures to quash any outbreak that might occur. The 72-hour standstill would maximize USDA’s chances to prevent spread of the ASF virus. Movement would be restored on a regionalized basis, said Ibach.
Infected and exposed pigs would be killed on the farm. To prevent spread of the virus, “composting and burial in place [are] preferred options,” said the USDA. It will pay hog farmers “a uniform, flat rate based on the size of affected premises” for washing down and sterilizing barns.
The ASF “action plan” had similar elements with USDA’s approach to the worst-ever epidemic of avian influenza that devastated U.S. egg and poultry production in 2014-15. An estimated 47.1 million fowl died, most of them egg-laying hens. Birds were euthanized in their barns and in many cases composted in them.