Spain has recorded 18 more cases of the deadly African swine fever (ASF) virus in Catalonia as authorities bring in drones and helicopters to help contain the outbreak.
On Monday, officials reported 18 additional wild boar deaths, bringing the tally up to almost 50. According to The Independent, officials say the rise was due to wider testing in hard-to-reach areas, explored by air over the holidays. Officials emphasized that this has been an “accumulation” of cases reported, and not a “sudden” spike.
Spain ramped up containment efforts in December, bringing in dogs and military personnel to help track the disease. More than 620 boars have been analyzed in recent weeks, with around 8% testing positive for the virus, the article said.
Investigations into the origin of the ASF strain had focused on a government laboratory situated close to the outbreaks, the IRTA-CReSA research centre, which was using strains of the disease in experimental studies and vaccine development, Pig World reports.
The investigation was sparked after a report by Spain’s agriculture ministry said the strain detected in the wild boar was similar to one detected in Georgia in the 2000s – and not linked to other variants circulating in the EU. It could, therefore, ‘not rule out the possibility that its origin lies in a biological containment facility.’
However, Barcelona’s Institute for Biomedical Research has announced that after testing the variant detected in wild boars, it does not match the strain used by researchers at the lab. The laboratory received 19 samples and, after analyzing 17, it provisionally ruled out the link, suggesting, instead, that the virus may represent a new, less virulent variant, Catalan News reports.
The Catalan government has sent the results to Spain’s agriculture ministry for an official report. According to local news sources, none of the analyzed samples matched the virus from the first two wild boar found dead in Cerdanyola or any of the roughly 800 ASF variants circulating worldwide. The closest resemblance is to the Georgian strain, from which it differs by 27 mutations.
Based on these findings, the IRB believes the virus is a newly evolved, low-virulence variant created through accumulated mutations.
Catalonia’s agriculture minister Òscar Ordeig announced that the first meeting of the Wild Boar Board, which is aiming to develop a strategy to contain Spain’s wild boar population, will be held Jan. 7.
