BIOSECURITY LEVELS AND RISK OF CLASSICAL SWINE FEVER DISEASE

ON LARGE PIG FARMS IN CHILE

Pinto Ja and Urcelay Sa.
VEERU, University of Reading, United Kingdom
Pig production requires a safe environment especially with regard to the hygienic
conditions in the production lines, which feed high quality products into pork markets.
Differences in terms of scale of production, standards of bio-security, production inputs
and marketing practices among pig farms would affect the potential risk of transmission,
and the spread to other farms in the event of reintroduction of CSF disease in Chile.
These variables can be quantified to provide an indicator of risk to introduce diseases on
pig farms through different mechanisms, such as contact with other farms, movement of
animals or mechanical transmission by feed and staff working in pig houses. A biosecurity scoring system can help to assess potential risk of getting or spreading diseases
in different pig farms.
Material and Methods
A questionnaire survey was applied in 50 large integrated pig farms located in the central
region of Chile between October 1997 and June 1998. This included bio-security, general
management and history of CSF on each farm. A bio-security scoring system was
developed for pig farms adapted from Leslie (1996), this method was originally
considered to systematically assess potential poultry bio-security hazards related with
infection at farm level.
The factors included in the bio-security score were 74 variables that are related to 12
main production components. Each individual variable was assessed on its, presence or
absence, and its effect on recognised good bio-security practices: a) +1 was added if the
variable increases bio-security; b) -1 was added if the variable decreases bio-security and
c) 0 was added if the variable does not modify bio-security. Consecutive steps or
procedures are followed to determine the final farm's susceptibility to CSF infection: a)
The farm's bio-security scoring is used as a base line and b) It is adjusted for the presence
or absence of factors that were previously implicated in the transmission of the disease
such as history of outbreaks, vaccination of pig herd routinely before the withdrawal of
vaccination and whether a pig farm is close to small or large farms with history of CSF.
Also a literature review looked at the factors most closely related with CSF infection at
farm level where a 50% of the outbreaks of CSF are represented by animal movement
between farms, 30% by mechanical contacts and 20% due to general poor prevention
measures (Stark, 1997; Horst, 1997). The bio-security score obtained is divided into these
three components and weighted consecutively in order to obtain the final CSF risk score.

Faculty of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, University of Chile. Casilla 2, Correo 15, Santiago, Chile.

Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics, 2000
Available at www.sciquest.org.nz

Results
The CSF risk score was computed for the 50 farms (mean=5.33, SE=0.47). Scores
indicates that pig holdings with negative values theoretically have a higher potential risk
of getting CSF while farms with positive values especially those with values close to
thirteen would have a lower potential risk of infection. CSF risk score was used as a
method to categorise farms into groups of similar potential risk and included in an ordinal
logistic regression. Three categories of risk were defined using CSF risk score, high risk,
medium risk and low risk category. 17 farms represented the high-risk group while the
other two, 15 and 18 farms represented medium and low risk farms respectively.

Predictor

Coefficie
nt

p
value

SD

Odds
Ratio

95% CI
of Odds ratio
Lower Upper

6.771 0.138
*
*
*
6.712 0.221
*
*
*
0.895 0.019
8.13
1.41
47.04
0.029 0.016
0.93
0.88
0.99
0.000 0.762
1.00
1.00
1.00
7
0.141 0.024
0.318
1.37
1.04
1.81
Pre-weaning
4
mortality
0.097
0.072 0.181
1.11
0.96
1.27
Parturition rates
Table 1 Ordinal logistic regression model
From the Table 1 is observed that sow replacement, insurance against CSF and preweaning mortality are significantly associated with high risk of CSF in pig farms.
However, variables such as herd size and parturition rates are unrelated with the
dependent variable. The odds ratio between those farms with insurance and farms without
insurance indicates that producers with insurance have approximately eight times
(OR=8.13) higher susceptibility to CSF than those without insurance.
Constant 1
Constant 2
Insurance
Replacement
Sows

-10.047
-8.226
2.096
-0.069
-0.0002

Discussion
Distribution of bio-security in pig units indicates that the implementation of disease
prevention measures must be encouraged strongly in those farms with low scores for biosecurity (Dijkhuizen, 1999). However, in those farms with positive scores of bio-security
the chances of infection by diseases such as CSF are minimised. Preventive measures
themselves are not a direct determinant of the risk of CSF infection, but classifications
based on potential risk must be carried out to evaluate the status of preventive animal
health (Meuwissen, et al., 1997). Scoring methods have been widely described, but they
have been rarely applied to animal health issues, especially to identify or classify farms
according to their susceptibility to diseases. A scoring method can be useful to evaluate
risk of CSF where prevention measures are combined with a quantification of main risk
factors to CSF (Davies, 1996). CSF risk scoring was based on bio-security scoring, but
2

Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics, 2000
Available at www.sciquest.org.nz

also included the main risk factors for CSF in addition to the history record of CSF in
each pig unit which facilitated the classification of pig farms in risk categories. The risk
of pig holdings getting CSF holdings is associated with farms with insurance, and with
high pre-weaning mortality, both parameters are related to the quality of prevention
measures taken by producers. The decreasing associated with an increasing level of
replacement in large pig farms could be explained because most pigs are supplied from a
few certified breeding units with a known low risk health status, and those not supplied
from these sources are provided by on-farm replacements. Insurance policy against CSF
in Chile seems not to have relation with an improved levels of bio-security in pig farms,
and higher-risks have been shown to be associated with insured pig farms. This may be
explained because these farms could tend to have an increased amount of animal
movement between pig holdings since large movement of animals has been indicated as a
main risk factor, especially in areas of high animal density (Horst, 1997; Stark, 1997).
Also hazard awareness could be influencing decisions at farm level because farms that
have insured their pig herds, at the same time they could increase their level of acceptable
risk because insurance protects potential losses (Howe and Whittaker, 1997). By contrast,
Davies in 1996 expected to find better bio-security on those farms, which had insurance.
Insurance companies are penalising high-risk farms with a high premium, and reward
low-risk farms with low premiums. Relaxation of bio-security measures on farms with
insurance can be tackled through epidemiological studies estimating the risk of diseases
in pig populations.
Conclusions
Preventive measures to control diseases like CSF were evaluated on pig farms using a
bio-security scoring system that denotes susceptibility to CSF. It incorporates the
history of CSF on each farm and specific risk factors associated with CSF.
Pig farms were classified as being in high, medium or low risk categories based on
CSF risk scoring system. This demonstrated the wide distribution of preventive
measures, and specific risk factors present at farm level.
High susceptibility to CSF was associated with farms with insurance, high preweaning mortality levels and low replacement rates.
An estimation of bio-security measures implemented by pig farms could be useful for
the same producers, insurance companies and veterinary services to understand the
state of disease preparedness in case of potential outbreaks of diseases such as CSF.
References
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Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics, 2000
Available at www.sciquest.org.nz

Howe, K. S. & Whittaker J. M. Guiding. 1997. Guiding Decisions on Methods and

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Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics, 2000
Available at www.sciquest.org.nz