Researchers at Kansas State University are conducting field studies and laboratory diagnostics, developing a disease model, and working with swine producers to test Porcine Circovirus type 2 (PCV2) vaccines.
Diseases associated with PCV2 were first identified in Canada in the early 1990s by veterinarians John Harding and Ted Clark. In 2005, a particularly severe form of Porcine Circovirus Associated Disease (PCVAD) appeared in Canada and parts of the U.S. resulting in elevated mortalities in finishing pigs.
A number of vaccines were recently licensed for use in the U.S., Canada and Europe. AASV member and Past-president Dr. Lisa Tokach and the Kansas State scientists have been working with producers to study the vaccines’ effectiveness in the field. This research is being funded by $70,000 in grants from the National Pork Board and the agriculture experiment station according to Dr. Bob Rowland, virologist for the Kansas State College of Veterinary Medicine. The vaccine study should be completed in about a month according to Rowland.
A brochure produced recently by the National Pork Board and the AASV describing PCVAD in detail is available on the AASV website.
Source:
Kansas State research and Extension,
http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/news/topstory.asp