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USDA to host third North American forum on African swine fever virus

African Swine Fever Virus (ASFV) has still not been detected in the U.S. or Canada, despite a string of cases reported in Asia, Europe and Central and South America.

As such, the USDA will host a two-day forum in Raleigh, North Carolina to discuss readying the industry for the arrival of ASFV. The forum will include in-person and virtual sessions and there will be representation from the U.S., Canada and Mexico as well as other Central and South American nations.

North Carolina State University will detail its model, which it calls PigSpread, to look at how a potential outbreak in its area of the U.S. might look. The model is based on data from almost 3,000 swine farms in the southeastern U.S. and includes analyses of six types of transmission, including farm-to-farm pig movements, vehicle movements and local spread.