Health group warns of pig disease

Reuters, Paris

The Paris-based animal health body Office International des Epizooties is considering adding the deadly pig illness PMWS to a list of diseases that must be declared internationally, an OIE official said on Friday.

But a proposal to include Post-weaning Multi-systematic Wasting Syndrome (PMWS) in an OIE list would not take effect until May 2002, Thierry Chillaud, head of information and international trade, told Reuters.

"We are currently studying the possibility, then we will submit it to our specialist commissions and propose it to member states," he said. "Then it would have to be adopted by our International Committee (at the) end of May 2002."

When a disease is included on one of the two OIE lists, each of the 158 member states must report any case of the illness and must meet certain criteria when trading potentially infected animals and animal products.

Chillaud said the pig disease had not yet been included in one OIE list of transmissible diseases because no member state had requested it.

"Not a single country has blown the whistle... not even Britain," he said.

A survey of major pig farms in England, due out soon from Britain's veterinary authorities, is expected to show that the disease has already infected up to 40 percent of the English pig herd since the late 1990s.

In Rome, the Food and Agriculture Organization said the pig disease could spread from Europe as far as Asia and Latin America.

This has recently increased worries about the syndrome which was first spotted in Canada in 1991.

PMWS can kill pigs suddenly or leave them listless and gaunt after losing weight. All officials have stressed it is not harmful to humans.

PMWS is present in many countries, including EU countries such as Britain, Ireland, Spain, Germany, France, Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands, according to the British Meat and Livestock Commission.