Since Iowa Select Farms stopped their gilt acclimation program in March 2022, the pork production system has only recorded six porcine epidemic diarrhea virus outbreaks in their sow farms. The 3% break rate is no small feat as the pork producer’s 800 nurseries and finishing sites are intermingled with sows farms throughout the state, putting the breeding herd at risk for geographical disease spread.
One area Iowa Select Farms credits for keeping the virus at bay is market trailer sanitation. During a recent webinar hosted by Swine Health Information Center and the American Association of Swine Veterinarians, Pete Thomas, DVM, and director of health services for Iowa Select Farms, pointed out it wasn’t until fall 2023 when the pork production system started washing all of their market trucks after every load, but it was an added protocol worth taking for the entire system.
“Our goals were basically to capture some of the losses that we were having due to lost weight, days to market, and also mortality post replacement in those sites during that early phase of grow out, and also to set a standard biosecurity culture in our system,” Thomas says. “That's the ultimate trump card when you try to talk to a grower about biosecurity and following some of your guidelines, and they tell you, ‘Well, you bring me a dirty trailer and infect my pigs with PED during marketing every time.’”
When PED broke across the system in the past, it cost the pork producer on average about 4.5 pounds and 4.5 days on feed to get those hogs to market. Weaned pigs saw a 3% uptick in mortality.
“PED breaks during the marketing process cost us about a $1.15 per pig marketed annually, directly from those breaks,” Thomas says.
After Iowa Select Farms started a volume flush and full power wash with disinfectants on their market trailers in week 46 of 2023, the number of PED outbreaks dropped.
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