Page 44 - Msingi Afrika Magazine Issue 19

Food Health

“The presumptive diagnosis is pig
pneumonia. Taking into account
that these pigs were bought in mod-
ern farms, where they have vacci-
nation programmes against viruses
and other diseases. These pigs were
moved to backyard areas on the bor-
der, where the physical and feeding
conditions produce health challeng-
es,” said Nuñez Mieses, in an official
statement released on June 29th.
“It is an inevitable health issue that
occurs permanently in backyard pigs
because they do not have adequate
sanitary and feeding conditions... [VIDEO] Backyard pigs in the Dominican Republic the eve of being culled as part of
We have the necessary medicines to governmental measures to stop African Swine Fever. About 100 pigs were put down with-
tackle this situation and it is already out being sick or infected.
under control”.

A few weeks later, in a radio inter- to another in multiple ways-- from If there is an isolated outbreak at a
view, Dr Nuñez Mieses reiterated dirty boots, the wheels of a truck, backyard operation, it can be quickly
that the disease was only a prob- contaminated meat, the movement and effectively controlled, as has
lem of backyard pigs in the border of live pigs and, perhaps most im- happened in other countries.[7] But
areas and assured listeners that the portantly, the trade in animal feed. if ASF gets into an industrial opera-
situation was under control and With the global interconnectedness tion-- whether a breeder farm, a hog
was not affecting other areas of of today’s pork industry, all coun- barn, a feed mill or a meat plant,
the country, like La Vega, where tries with pig herds are or should be then multiple routes for transmis-
the large, industrial pig farms are on high alert for signs of this ASF sion open up, and the disease can
concentrated. “The problem started variant. The Dominican Republic, quickly get out of control. This is
in the border area and that is where evidently, was not. what happened in Eastern Europe
it is contained.” and Asia, and it is likely what hap-
Back in early April 2021, over 200 pened in the Dominican Republic
He was dead wrong. On July 28, pigs died of disease at an enclosed since La Vega’s pig farming compa-
2021, a US lab confirmed the worst: farm in the municipality of La Vega, nies supply piglets, feed and other
samples collected from dead pigs in the centre of the country and in products to industrial and backyard
were positive for the lethal African the heartland of its industrial pig farms throughout the country.
Swine Fever (ASF). farming sector and pig breeding. Dr. Bolívar Echevarria, a veterinari-
The government collected samples an in the country’s northwest, work-
ASF returns to the Americas after but did not undertake tests, until lat- ing with pig farmers, says the disease
40 years er in July, when these samples were could also have been inadvertently
sent along with a batch of samples spread by the technical staff of the
ASF is a deadly pig disease that led collected from other farms with Ministry of Agriculture, who went
to the eradication of the entire pig outbreaks. According to an official from farm to farm in June thinking
herd on the Island of the Domin- report of the World Animal Health the disease was pneumonia.
ican Republic and Haiti when it Organisation (OIE) published on
last struck the Caribbean in the late August 25th, 2021, this farm is listed The Dominican Republic is now
1970s. A new ASF variant emerged as having the country’s first ASF scrambling to deal with the situa-
in Eastern Europe in 2007, and has outbreak, beginning on April 10th. tion at a huge cost to the country’s
since spread to Asia-- leading to small pig farmers. The government’s
the death of around a quarter of all This would help to explain how “Plan A” involves a mass cull of all
pigs on the planet. ASF is a highly ASF spread so rapidly across the backyard pigs that are within a 3km
persistent disease that can be trans- country. ASF is deadly, but transmis- radius of outbreaks or that are near
mitted from an affected operation sion from pig to pig occurs slowly. to industrial farms, in an effort to

44 | we tell the true afrikan story