Japan to vaccinate farm pigs to contain swine fever

September 20, 2019

Tokyo--The Japanese government will shift policy and enable vaccinations of farm pigs in a bid to prevent the spread of swine fever, agriculture minister Taku Eto said Friday.

The agriculture ministry will revise epidemic control guidelines to enable farm pig vaccinations, Eto said. The vaccinations will cover areas hit by swine fever outbreaks, sources familiar with the matter said.

Vaccine makers will be asked to increase their production, Eto said.

The ministry thinks there is no choice but to start vaccinating farm pigs, as Japan has been unable to contain the spread of swine fever a year after the first outbreak of the highly contagious disease in the country in 26 years was detected in the central prefecture of Gifu.

The decision was made after a swine fever outbreak was confirmed at a pig farm in Saitama Prefecture, north of Tokyo, last week following infections mainly in the Chubu central region.

Currently, the epidemic control guidelines call for slaughtering all pigs at affected farms, including uninfected pigs. Preventive vaccination is not allowed.

The Japanese government has been negative about giving vaccinations to farm pigs due to difficulties eradicating the virus while there are wild boars carrying the disease.

In addition, there have been concerns that Japan may face problems exporting pork if it loses its status as a swine fever-free country, due to vaccinations, under the rules of the World Organization for Animal Health.

Since swine fever infection was confirmed in Gifu in September last year, the disease has spread to pigs in five other prefectures--Aichi, Mie, Fukui, Saitama and Nagano.

A total of more than 135,000 pigs have been culled in the six prefecture as well as Osaka and Shiga prefectures, where piglets infected with the disease were shipped. Jiji Press