The Swine Health Information Center reports January 2026 saw particularly high levels of Influenza A and Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea infections. As part of its February eNewsletter the Swine Health Information Center has released its monthly domestic and global swine disease monitoring reports.SHIC Associate Director Dr. Lisa Becton says January saw increased levels of both Influenza A and Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea.
Quote-Dr. Lisa Becton-Swine Health Information Center:
Influenza A virus reached 42.2 percent case positivity in wean to market pigs and this is the highest January level in the past decade. For adults and sow farms there was a 27.4 percent case positivity and that had the highest January level since 2023.The Advisory Committee noted that this could be a normal seasonal pattern, however there can also be a brief surge in the winter and additional association with PRRS outbreaks.
PED case positivity increased to 12.6 in January rising outside of the expected range in adult and sows, reaching 14 percent, the highest level since 2022.
The wean to market category climbed to 17.5 percent, it's highest level since 2024.The PED virus does survive well in cooler weather and it becomes very hard to perform acceptable sanitation of trailers or barns or other areas when producers are facing sub-freezing temperatures so it's very important to come back to different biosecurity principles and understand what are practices that can be done to reduce potential contaminated manure from getting back to clean pigs.
But it is important to understand that this time of year is a particularly challenging one but focussing on biosecurity steps really can yield benefits.
The Swine Health Information Center's global and domestic swine health monitoring reports can be accessed through SHIC's February eNewsletter at swinehealth.org.
Source : Farmscape.ca