Abstract
Simple SummaryPorcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) is a viral disease responsible for huge economic losses to the pig industry. The selection of PRRSV resilient sows has been proposed as a strategy to control this disease. A simulation model was developed to test the differences in reproductive performance and economic outcome of resilient or susceptible sows under farm PRRSV endemic conditions with or without recurrent PRRSV outbreaks. The data from phenotyped sows came from a PRRSV-positive farm with 1500 sows that suffered a PRRSV outbreak that lasted 24 weeks within three years. The reproductive parameters were generally better for resilient than for susceptible sows in PRRSV-positive farms suffering recurrent PRRSV outbreaks. Consequently, the piglet production cost was lower for resilient than for susceptible sows in any condition but showed only significant differences in PRRSV endemic farms suffering recurrent outbreaks. Finally, the annual gross margin by sow is significantly better for resilient than for susceptible sows under endemic conditions with or without recurrent outbreaks. Thus, the selection of PRRSV resilient sows is always a profitable approach for producers supporting the control of this disease.The selection of porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) resilient sows has been proposed as a strategy to control this disease. A discrete event-based simulation model was developed to mimic the outcome of farms with resilient or susceptible sows suffering recurrent PRRSV outbreaks. Records of both phenotypes were registered in a PRRSV-positive farm of 1500 sows during three years. The information was split in the whole period of observation to include a PRRSV outbreak that lasted 24 weeks (endemic/epidemic or En/Ep) or only the endemic phase (En). Twenty simulations were modeled for each farm: Resilient/En, Resilient/En_Ep, Susceptible/En, and Susceptible/En_Ep during twelve years and analyzed for the productive performance and economic outcome, using reference values. The reproductive parameters were generally better for resilient than for susceptible sows in the PRRSV En/Ep scenario, and the contrary was observed in the endemic case. The piglet production cost was always lower for resilient than for susceptible sows but showed only significant differences in the PRRSV En/Ep scenario. Finally, the annual gross margin by sow is significantly better for resilient than for susceptible sows for the PRRSV endemic (12%) and endemic/epidemic scenarios (17%). Thus, the selection of PRRSV resilient sows is a profitable approach for producers to improve disease control.
Highlights
Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRSV) is the most economically significant disease impacting commercial pig production in North America, Europe, andAsia [1]
We demonstrated that, in commercial PRRSV-infected farms, PRRSV resilient sows had less loss of piglets at birth. These sows were phenotyped as resilient if their serum was negative for PRRSV by PCR at seven and 21 d post-vaccination (DPV) with a PRRSV modified live vaccine or as susceptible if their serum was positive by PCR at seven and/or 21 DPV [11]
In a PRRSV endemic scenario, the repetition rate (7.9% ± 0.5%), number of artificial inseminations by mating (3.14 ± 0.02), the age of culled sows (764 ± 22 days), and the number of piglets produced by culled sow (48.6 ± 1.5 piglets) were significantly lower for susceptible than for resilient sows
Summary
Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRSV) is the most economically significant disease impacting commercial pig production in North America, Europe, andAsia [1]. It has been described that there is a variation in the reproductive performance among sows in response to PRRSV infection, which suggests that there is a scope to select sows for PRRSV resilience [7,8,9,10]. We demonstrated that, in commercial PRRSV-infected farms, PRRSV resilient sows had less loss of piglets at birth. The overall efficiency of PRRSV resilient sows remains to be proven for producers In this sense, modeling could provide new knowledge about the efficiency of PRRSV resilient and susceptible sows in a commercial setting. This information is very difficult to be obtained experimentally due to the necessity to have a complete farm with PRRSV resilient or susceptible sows. In the literature, modeling has been used to predict the effects of future interventions for PRRSV control and its economic impact [12,13]
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