Following the recent detections in the U.S. of HPAI in neonatal goats with neurological disease, and cows with “Texas agalactia”:
i. We need to be mindful that there is a lot we don’t know about the role and impact of HPAI in both dairy cows and goats (short blurbs on both species’ recent US detections are under the news widget on the WeCAHN homepage). Currently the number of HPAI detections in Texas agalactia cows in the southern US is notably lower than detections in those same animals of some more familiar pathogens, although that may also change quickly as the USDA now tests more of these cases for HPAI.
ii. Consulting with a couple of our western veterinary lab diagnosticians, they both felt that as of now, the best diagnostic plan if practitioners are confronted with suspect cases of Texas agalactia here in western Canada, is to phone your local lab and get their guidance on what samples to collect and what tests to request. You would likely be advised to collect most or all of the sample set recommended by AABP recently, and request a range of tests, as opposed to just testing for HPAI.
iii. That said, re-framing, our western labs are good at testing samples for HPAI at this point and likely a pretty similar procedure would be followedif this testing is requested.
iv. The potential risks of HPAI in ruminants to animal or public health currently are unclear; we are just beginning to study them. However, assessing the role of a specific agent in a new disease isn’t a novel question. The best efforts of everyone involved in the regional and national animal health networks (veterinarians, lab diagnosticians, vet college faculty, researchers, producers) are on this problem.
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Beef surveillance in western Canada
Poultry surveillance in western Canada
Dairy surveillance in western Canada
Smallholder livestock production surveillance in western Canada
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