The Rural Voice, 1979-06, Page 54Four veterinarians told Huron County Hog producers about the
bacteria that's been killing their pigs at a meeting in Londesboro
recently. From left are Dr. Ernest Sardford, Dr. Soren
Rosenthal, Dr. Mike Weber and Dr. Bob Friendship.
Killer disease hits
Western Ontario swine
BY BEV BROWN
For years he had been successfully running his feeder barn --
buying the weanlings at 45 lbs. from various sources and
growing them up to market weight. He'd had his share of
problems, but nothing too serious or difficult to handle.
Then one morning in January he came into the barn and found
two dead pigs, each around 100 lbs. in weight. He hauled them
out of the barn and got busy with the chores -- too busy to call the
dead animal truck that day. Just as well.
Next morning there were 10 dead pigs -- all around 80 - 100
lbs. They had all looked perfectly healthy the night before. But
now he noticed quite a few pigs who obviously were not f eeling
well. He injected these with penicillin. Then he loaded two of the
bodies onto his truck and took them into his veterinarian. The
post mortem didn't take many minutes. They ugly, red and
damaged lungs looked like the pig had swallowed a firecracker
which had exploded inside the lungs. The vet immediately
diagnosed the pig had died of Hermorrhagic pleuropneumonia,
caused by a bacteria called Hemophilus pleuropneumoniae.
Even then the farmer aid not fully realize the seriousness of
PG. 52 THE RURAL VOICE/JUNE 1979
his situation. He drove home with a supply of chloramphenical
for his water supply. Hopefully this would start the cure.
Next morning there were twenty dead pigs. The next day
thirty more died. Was he on the right drug? Was there
something more he could be doing? Back to the vet who ordered
a switch to another anti -biotic.
But the deaths continued to increase in number. In a few days
the vet told the farmer to go back to the chloramphenicol but to
double its strength. Finally, the number of deaths each day
decreased. But the farmer had lost 30% per cent of his finishing
barn and the remaining pigs were growing very slowly.
This tragic series of events has been repeated, perhaps with
some variations, in countless numbers of hog barns throughout
Mddlesex, Huron and Perth Counties during January, February
and March of this year. In mid-April the number of cases started
to drop off and the disease slowed down as mysteriously as it had
first exploded.
The reasons for the explosive outbreak and the gradual
slowing down of this killer hog disease is not known. But in the
opinion of Dr. Ernest Sanford, of the Huron Park Vet Services