Review of the Food-borne Zoonoses Research ... - ARCHIVE: Defra

We created a farm-fork quantitative risk assessment model that indicates reducing
between-pen transmission, e.g. by not mixing pigs, is crucial. No more than one third of
human STM cases may be attributable to GB pigs and a reduction in prevalence on farm
will result in some public health benefit.
Review Summary
This project is considered to have produced good basic work, which needed to be done.
In order to reduce the incidence of salmonella in pigs, it is vital to look at the basic
epidemiology of the infection in these animals, which is complex. Progress has been
painfully slow but a lot of basic work needed to be done. This project has produced
important basic information about the prevalence of salmonella in finishing pig farms in
UK and identified risk factors for herds becoming infected.
Project OZO316 provided an early and important attempt at joint Defra/industry
partnership. The poor support for the intervention trial was disappointing and affected the
scientific value of that part of the project. Useful lessons were learned about projects
involving collaboration with industry, which have been helpful in delivering subsequent
Defra/industry research on the poultry side.
This work has led into the next project OZ0323 and this work is still on-going. OZ0323
includes extensions to include the potential impact from farm to retailer. OZ0323 is a
worthwhile, multi-disciplinary project and should clarify many questions concerning
salmonellosis in pigs, from which future control strategies can be determined, although
farm-level risk factors can be difficult to identify for a multi-factorial disease. The study
highlighted the difficulties in successfully implementing interventions to decrease the
prevalence of salmonella. One query that arose was the difference between test results
and prevalence.
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