Just because you are doing something well doesn’t mean you can’t do it better — this is particularly meaningful when it comes to protecting your swine operation in the age of rising porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) viral breaks.
We have always taken biosecurity protocols seriously at its managed farms. But CVS Partner Clayton Johnson, DVM, and I recently decided to revisit these for retooling in our new Biosecurity Initiative, partly in light of an updated study from Iowa State University’s Derald Holtkamp that showed PRRS production losses in the U.S. doubled between 2010 and 2020, to $1.2 billion annually.
Although producers’ steadily improving biosecurity measures have made it more difficult for the virus to invade their operations, what it means is the ones getting through are more virulent, more frustrating and, often, more devastating. In doing this update, we found most of what CVS farm managers and employees were doing was scientifically sound, so we refined those into a list of seven focus areas.
A Review of Common Areas for Improvement
You can review this list we created of main areas to focus biosecurity measures on your own operation, and consider if you and your workers are comfortable with your protocols or where tweaks or updates are appropriate:
Feed and supply entry
For feed, we didn’t revamp it - but feed mitigants are included in Carthage System diets. Those mitigants are based on the feedmill’s capabilities from using liquid products like SalCurb (which requires a specialized system) to dry products, like Activate DA.For supplies, what steps can you take to reduce your number of arrivals? Can you establish a monthly delivery instead of “as needed?” Another recommendation is to quarantine new supplies in a dedicated storage space for seven nights as a disinfectant chamber, to deprive any lingering pathogens of living hosts, before putting them in their normal spots. If you can’t spare that large an area for a week but you can for 2-3 nights, realize that any improvement to biosecurity is better than none.
- Employees’ lunches
If you don’t already have one, create a plan and protocols for securely bringing in their lunches to minimize their chance of bringing outside pathogens into the barn. - Movement of individuals through the farm via showers
Be sure employees and visitors to the barn understand the importance of the shower-in and shower-out process, and keep on-site supporting documentation to prove its effectiveness in combating disease. We understand this is a cumbersome step, so it’s good to be able to explain why it’s necessary. - Movement of animals.
Reexamine protocols for loading cull sows, wean pigs and market hogs as carefully as you would apply those for unloading new arrivals. Make sure you have a process for cleaning, disinfecting and drying trucks and trailers (and if this is done off-farm, no matter how nearby, consider there is still a minor chance for contamination between the wash and your barn). - Mortality management
You need to safely remove carcasses while maintaining biosecurity. Having a dead-drop, especially for farrowing and after-birth areas, is vital to keeping living animals secure from pathogens. Many farm owners have invested in dead-drops — if you have not because of cost, consider the competing expense of closing for months because of a PRRS or other disease break. - Manure management
As with any other supplier coming on-farm, make sure manure pumpers are following your biosecurity protocols and maintaining safe airflow while pumping out pits, as well as tarping off the pump-out and resealing the cover properly when finished. - Supplies and animal transporters/drivers
As important as your biosecurity is regarding vehicles, equipment and other supplies, the same needs to apply to the drivers and workers with them. Be sure they understand their responsibility to adhere to your barn’s protocols and maintain documentation (as for the shower usage above).
Bonus Biosecurity Thoughts
Biosecurity measures are always updating — what was airtight practice two years ago might require adjustments now thanks to new research or availability of supplies, or one of a hundred other reasons.
For instance, recent research has shown that fogging new or contaminated supplies and areas might not be the most effective way to disinfect, as the mist may not fully infiltrate crevices where needed. In this case, additionally pump-spraying liquid disinfectant directly on surfaces and allowing proper downtime seems to boost coverage against pathogens such as the PRRS virus.
On the other hand, an existing practice may still be your best defense — sometimes only needing extra attention. A good example of this is the use of a Danish entry for loading out weaned pigs. Rather than replace this effective step, we can add cameras at entryways to ensure these areas are being used as intended, to minimize the chances of carrying pathogens into a barn. Thanks to technological advances making them less expensive than they used to be, Wi-Fi cameras can also be mounted in other high-traffic areas of the operation, including parking lots and supply truck entry venues, to increase biosecurity accountability.
Rather than being a “spy” measure, these cameras are to provide audit opportunities to producers and farm managers. It behooves you to watch how people are using your own protocols every so often, to check for common mistakes that can be easily corrected; and to look for “cracks” in your system you have not considered, that you need to address.
It’s also critical to make sure you accommodate your team members so they can meet biosecurity requirements. A large number of swine farm employees’ first language is Spanish, and some may understand little to no English. Provide verbal training and written materials so all employees can understand, even if that means hiring a translator.
Also, be open to receiving ideas from employees and other producers about changing biosecurity measures as needed. I believe it helps when the direction is not just coming from farm management but also from other educated sources — and it’s often the case that workers seeing their colleagues do something successfully and having that peer-to-peer support is the best way to learn.
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Dyneah M. Classen, DVM, has been a veterinarian with Carthage Veterinary Service since 2007. She is a partner as well as its director of health, responsible for the overall health for assigned herds in the Carthage system. Her focus is providing leadership to the health team and sharing responsibility for protecting the integrity of food safety policies and procedures. She received her Doctorate of Veterinary Medicine from the University of Illinois.
