Last month Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea was confirmed on two sow operations in southeast Manitoba.

Florian Possberg, the chair of the Saskatchewan Pork Development Board, notes there's over 8500 confirmed cases in 31 US states, we have cases in Ontario, and it's a little disturbing that we're seeing more evidence of it in Manitoba.

Florian Possberg-Saskatchewan Pork Development Board:

There is a couple of active cases in Manitoba.

We still have not found any cases in Saskatchewan, or Alberta and British Columbia which is good and beneficial for us.

We know we've got producers really sensitised to high biosecurity.

By far the best way to deal with it is prevention and so things like truck washes and sanitation, biosecurity for people coming into units and how we feed our animals, make sure there's no contamination in any of our feed ingredients.

Those are things that we really need at a high level to keep the disease out.
We've had the opportunity of learning from areas, particularly the United States, that have had to deal with these problems.

I think because we've had good communication we've been able to learn from the experiences of our neighbors and use that information to help us to reduce our risks so we really appreciate the participation and communication we've been able to have with areas that have had to deal with this.

Mr Possberg says containing the infection is really an industry wide effort and, because the consequences of getting the disease are so significant, we're really putting a lot effort into prevention.