Abstract
African swine fever (ASF) is a viral disease of suids that frequently leads to death. There are neither licensed vaccines nor treatments available, and even though humans are not susceptible to the disease, the serious socio-economic consequences associated with ASF have made it one of the most serious animal diseases of the last century. In this context, prevention and early detection play a key role in controlling the disease and avoiding losses in the pig value chain. Target biosecurity measures are a strong strategy against ASF virus (ASFV) incursions in farms nowadays, but to be efficient, these measures must be well-defined and easy to implement, both in commercial holdings and in the backyard sector. Furthermore, the backyard sector is of great importance in low-income settings, mainly for social and cultural practices that are highly specific to certain areas and communities. These contexts need to be addressed when authorities decide upon the provisions that should be applied in the case of infection or decide to combine them with strict preventive measures to mitigate the risk of virus spread. The need for a deeper understanding of the smallholder context is essential to prevent ASFV incursion and spread. Precise indications for pig breeding and risk estimation for ASFV introduction, spread and maintenance, taking into account the fact that these recommendations would be inapplicable in some contexts, are the keys for efficient target control measures. The aim of this work is to describe the 305 outbreaks that occurred in domestic pigs in Sardinia during the last epidemic season (2010–2018) in depth, providing essential features associated with intensive and backyard farms where the outbreaks occurred. In addition, the study estimates the average of secondary cases by kernel transmission network. Considering the current absence of ASF outbreaks in domestic pig farms in Sardinia since 2018, this work is a valid tool to specifically estimate the risk associated with different farm types and update our knowledge in this area.
Highlights
African swine fever (ASF) is a devastating disease of domestic and wild pigs, frequently resulting in the death of infected animals
Virulent ASF virus (ASFV) isolates are generally fatal, while animals infected with attenuated ASFV strains may not show typical clinical signs [8]
Even though Sardinia has not yet been declared free from ASF, the island context seems to be appropriate for the purpose of this work, given that the last ASFV outbreak in domestic pigs dates back to 2018 and the last virus finding in the wild boar to April 2019 [38]
Summary
African swine fever (ASF) is a devastating disease of domestic and wild pigs, frequently resulting in the death of infected animals. Even though Sardinia has not yet been declared free from ASF, the island context seems to be appropriate for the purpose of this work, given that the last ASFV outbreak in domestic pigs dates back to 2018 and the last virus finding in the wild boar to April 2019 [38]. This allows to provide in details the risk factors associated with the occurrence of ASF at farm level. Multilevel logistic mixed models were applied to establish the main farm’ characteristics involved in the probability of observing an untimely outbreak
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