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1. U.S. unprepared for foreign animal disease outbreak
By Mark Dorenkamp
BrownfieldAgNews.com
May 26, 2016
A pork industry leader says the U.S. needs to be better prepared to handle a foreign animal disease outbreak.
On Thursday, past president of the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) Dr. Howard Hill told a Senate Agriculture subcommittee hearing on livestock that foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) poses a serious threat to hog farmers.
"USDA and the livestock industry has been working on a plan to combat an outbreak, but the only practical way is through the use of vaccination. Unfortunately we currently don't have the ability to produce the number of doses needed for an initial outbreak, or the capacity to produce more vaccine."
Consistent with a Homeland Security presidential directive, Hill says an adequate FMD vaccine bank must be established.
"This would require an off-shore vendor-maintained bank that would have available anigen concentrate to produce against all 23 of the most common foot-and-mouth disease types currently circulating in the world."
The pork industry is also calling for a vendor-managed inventory of 10 million doses, which Hill says is the estimated need during the first two weeks of an FMD outbreak.
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2. Crowing the happy news: Chickens return to State Fair [NY]
By Rick Karlin, Capitol bureau
Albany Times Union [blog post]
May 31, 2016
Last year's ban on chickens and other fowl at the State Fair, due to fears about avian flu, has been lifted.
Here are details along with some clucking, crowing happy quotes:
State Agriculture Commissioner Richard A. Ball today announced the end of the ban on all live fowl competitions and exhibits at the Great New York State Fair and at all county fairs in New York. The Department had issued the ban in May 2015 to prevent the spread of strains of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), which killed millions of birds across the country in 2014-2015 and was confirmed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) as being the worst outbreak of HPAI in U.S. history.
"New York took an aggressive approach to preventing the spread of avian influenza and it paid off," said Commissioner Ball. "Thanks to the cooperation of farmers, suppliers, distributors, and live bird markets, as well as the hard work of the Department's Division of Animal Industry, the outbreak did not affect any birds in the state and we look forward to their return at fairs this summer."
"Lifting this ban was possible due to the efforts of the poultry industry, here in New York and throughout the U.S., to stop the spread of HPAI and to improve biosecurity practices. We are indebted to state and federal animal health officials who contained HPAI in the Midwest," said State Veterinarian Dr. David Smith. "While we are confident the threat has diminished and bird competitions can resume, it's important to note that the virus causing HPAI may arise any time, so our producers must remain vigilant and continue to adhere to the best practices for preventing the spread of this disease."
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3. Dr. Rick Sibbel to lead Merck food-animal technical services
By Merck Animal Health
Bovine Veterinarian
May 31, 2016
Rick Sibbel, DVM, has been named Executive Director of Technical Services for Merck Animal Health's recently formed U.S. Food Animal Team. In his new role, Dr. Sibbel oversees the technical services and pharmacovigilance groups for the company's ruminants, swine and poultry businesses.
"I'm delighted to lead this group of talented and committed veterinarians and Ph.D. ruminant nutritionists - a group committed to working across the food production sectors to help ensure we can continue to help put safe, high-quality meals on the tables of families around the world," said Dr. Sibbel. "At the same time, it's also our job to help make sure we are focusing on animal well-being for those animals under our veterinary care. Balanced animal well-being husbandry practices, using sound science and the proper use of technologies are critical to animal health and performance and pivotal to the safe, efficient production of food."
With more than 35 years of experience in veterinary medicine, Dr. Sibbel has helped bring more than 20 vaccines the livestock and poultry markets. He played leading roles in the development and launch of the first genetically engineered pseudo rabies vaccine, the first influenza vaccine for swine and the first viral-vectored vaccine for poultry. He held previous roles at the company including Director of U.S. Beef Cattle Technical Services and Global Ruminant Technical Services Group Director.
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4. OIE's New Priorities Include Working Equid Health, Welfare
By Christa Lest�-Lasserre, MA
TheHorse.com
May 31, 2016
The health and welfare of working equids throughout the world has become one of the "new priorities" for the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), OIE officials said May 24 in Paris, France.
Convening for the organization's 84th General Assembly, the 840 participants representing many of the 180 OIE member countries are expected to vote this week to adopt the condition of working equids as one of its key focal points for the upcoming year.
"It's an important subject concerning many countries, as equids are still widely used for work throughout the world, especially traction work," said Director General Monique Eloit, DVM. "This topic is a new priority for us, and it's the beginning of a larger project, because it will later be expanded to other species of animals used for labor, such as bovines."
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5. U.S. advisers sign off on plan for reviewing risky virus studies
By Jocelyn Kaiser
Science Magazine
May 27, 2016
A board of advisers this week signed off on a proposal for how the U.S. government should go about deciding whether to fund certain studies that could potentially create dangerous human pathogens. The plan now goes to government officials, who say they hope to put out a policy by the end of year. Still unclear, however, is exactly when they will lift an 19-month-old ban that has halted a handful of virology studies.
The report from the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) is meant to guide decisions about so-called gain-of-function (GOF) studies-experiments that modify a pathogen in ways that could make it more transmissible and more pathogenic in humans. Such studies can help experts prepare for pandemics, but they also pose risks if the altered pathogen should escape the lab. In 2011, two GOF studies with the deadly H5N1 avian influenza virus sparked a lengthy NSABB discussion over whether the work should even be published. (Ultimately, the NSABB said it should be.) The studies also led to a new oversight policy for certain H5N1 experiments.
Then in 2014, more papers on risky flu viruses, along with some mishaps at federal labs, convinced U.S. officials that existing policies weren't enough. In October 2014, the White House announced a "pause" on new funding for 18 GOF studies of influenza, SARS, and MERS viruses (although several projects were later exempted). Officials then asked a revived NSABB to come up with a process for overseeing risky GOF studies.
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6. New blood test for the detection of bovine TB [UK]
University of Nottingham
EurekAlert
May 31, 2016
A new blood test to detect Mycobacteria in blood has been developed by a team at The University of Nottingham led by Dr Cath Rees, an expert in microbiology in the School of Biosciences and Dr Ben Swift from the School of Veterinary Medicine and Science.
The researchers have used this new method to show that cattle diagnosed with bovine tuberculosis (bTB) have detectable levels of the bacterium Mycobacterium bovis (M. bovis) in their blood which causes this disease.
'Evidence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex bacteraemia in intradermal skin test positive cattle detected using phage-RPA' has been published online in the peer reviewed medical journal Virulence.
Dr Rees said: "This test delivers results within 48 hours and the frequency in which viable mycobacteria were detected in the blood of skin test positive animals changes the paradigm of this disease."
This new, simple and inexpensive blood test detects very low levels of mycobacteria in blood using a bacteriophage-based technique developed by The University of Nottingham. The group has patented an improved version of the method that delivers results in just six hours. More recently 'proof of principal' experiments have shown that this is even more sensitive. This is currently licenced to a spin out company, PBD Biotech Ltd.
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