PED Spreads to Oklahoma Pork Producers
US - Around 1.3 million hogs have been killed by the Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus (PEDv) since the disease was discovered in the US, according to a Reuters story. And there is evidence the virus — which humans can't get — is carried by wind.
24 September 2013
2 minute read
According to The Oklahoman, Greg Stephens General Manager of Prestage Farms' hog farm in the Oklahoma Panhandle said it experienced “substantial” losses in June as the virus spread through its herd.
“For three to four weeks, just about everything born died,” he said. The virus affects nursing pigs and has a mortality rate of 80 per cent to 100 per cent. Most die within 72 hours from dehydration associated with diarrhea.
In the Reuters article, John Prestage, senior vice president of Prestage, described how 30,000 pigs died “in the blink of an eye.” Seaboard Foods, a large pork producer with hog farms near Guymon, wouldn't say how many of its piglets have died from PEDv, but researchers found the virus in air samples taken nearby.
Workers can spread the disease by tracking contaminated manure on their shoes from one truck to the next as hogs arrive at the processing plants, explained Roy Lee Lindsey, executive director at the Oklahoma Pork Council.
