African Swine Fever Is Spreading and Eliminating It Will Take Decades

[caf]

This is pretty horrifying:

A United Nations report suggests some food-waste containing pork was dumped from a ship visiting the port of Poti on the Georgian Black Sea and then eaten by one of the local pigs that are allowed to scavenge on garbage. Within weeks, 30,000 pigs had died and 80 percent of Georgia’s districts were thought to be infected.

[ohiovr]

I learned recently that pigs are fed all kinds of scraps even pork. Why aren’t they vulnerable to diseases similar to mad cow disease?

[SubiculumCode]

Has there been any talk of risk that it can jump species?

[bayareanative]

Meat agriculture at large scale always presents a pandemic risk... zillions of animals crammed next to each other peeing and pooping next to human workers is never A Good Thing™, because it's a worse Petri dish/bioreactor than a college dorm or a hospital. Also, the antibiotics given to meat ag animals also risks human antibiotic resistance if the same one is given to animals. These are the main reasons I don't eat meat. In a sane world without corporate capture, fossil fuel use and meat ag would end immediately. Vegetarianism is necessary but often feels pointless like screaming into a hurricane while waiting for Godot.

[ohiovr]

When I first read about African Swine fever last year it was reported to have a "100%" mortality rate. Its like the swine version of ebola.

[hyperbovine]

Contrary to popular belief, the mortality rate of Ebola is “only” around 50%.

[duxup]

Ebola doesn't transmit very easily....this does.

[inawarminister]

I don't eat pork (religious reasons) but I'm curious on why this virus is so lethal? Climate change letting African germs survive in North Eurasia? Are there any equivalents for other domesticated animals? Yes, there's Bird Flu which is similar (and worse in that it can jump species to humans), but what about cattle? Sheeps? ... Cats and dogs?

[zyxzevn]

From the text:" One of their difficulties is that the large, complex DNA virus that causes African swine fever has some 170 genes and 80 proteins, many of them specialized in evading different aspects of the pig immune system. "

So it is evolution, probably facilitated by certain conditions.

A huge amount of genes is also a weakness and might be targetted with specialized measures (like a proteine/gene-blocker). But the usual tricks wont work as well.

[rangibaby]

My understanding is that bird flu is deadlier for humans (see: Spanish Flu) but swine flu is considered more of a risk of mutating into human flu

[SubiculumCode]

This is exactly the kind of virus we need to understand how to build a vaccine. Something like this in humans is scary. Here is to hoping that our understanding of biology is reaching a point where we have more methods of attacking these kind of things.

[burfog]

Food animals don't get the option to travel around town at will. There should be no possible way for the disease to spread.

The fact that the disease does spread means that farms are failing to provide biohazard isolation.

We can see a similar problem with chickens. We actually give vaccines to chickens. The vaccines would be pointless if the chickens were properly isolated from contamination. Viruses do not spontaneously form from chickens or from non-living matter.

[onion2k]

Disease can be spread by more ways than simple food-animal-to-food-animal contact. For example, bovine TB kills cows but doesn't kill badgers, so a badger can spread it between herds. You can't stop that by isolating the cows.

There was a very controversial cull of badgers here in an attempt to stop it but even that didn't work.

Disease management is hard.

[ohiovr]

One attack vector of the disease is transmission through tick bites. Ticks then bite boars. Swine fever also takes enough time to begin acting that a herd can become infected without there being any signs till it is too late to mitigate. Swine fever can also be transmitted by feed but it isn’t clear to me how that works. Sometimes pigs are fed to pigs but I don’t see how that would lead to a supply feed infection.

[taneq]

> Viruses do not spontaneously form from chickens or from non-living matter.

Well, they kind of do (albeit at a very low rate). Where else did the first ones come from?

[geggam]

Considering the similarity in Pigs and Humans shouldnt this be raising all sorts of alarms ?

[Bakary]

This thought process seems to use a similar logic as preventing STDs through abstinence.

[markdown]

Since your entire village let alone town/city/country/continent is never going to go vegan, this isn't a solution to the problem.

[darkpuma]

Could this virus help eradicate wild populations of feral hogs?

Protecting the pork industry is all well and good, I love ham as much as anybody else, but sacrificing a few years of pork production seems like it could be a good deal if it means the eradication of environmentally destructive feral hogs.

[soulofmischief]

This is how you destroy an ecosystem. Bringing in one organism to fight or replace another without thinking about the full consequences.