Good ol' Benny there had some great advice, though it is rarely heard today. He was actually referring to fire prevention, but for near 150 years it would become the motto of mothers, doctors, and farmers looking to explain the practice of preventative care.
I'm sure you've all heard it before, but probably from someone 70 years and older. A grandparent, an elderly neighbor, someone from a generation that was born during that time period. They heard it their entire lives, as they were kept home from school for fear of contracting small pox or polio, both illnesses that had a terrifying rate of contagion. They heard it from their grandmothers who were soaping their tomato plants, and grandfathers who were burning the loosestrife. Their doctors would say that an apple a day would keep the doctor at bay. It was a period where cures weren't advanced enough to prevent disease and illness from overcoming the sick, so prevention really was the only method a person could use to survive. They had no idea at the time that what they were actually doing was Bio-Security.
Then Louis Pasteur entered the scene in the late 19th century, and during the 1800's compulsory vaccination was all the rage across the country. It wasn't until 1905 that the Supreme Court determined that it was unconstitutional. Irregardless, at that point, the 'ounce of prevention' had turned to medicine, instead of bio-security. In the 20th century, as quickly as diseases were discovered, a vaccine or treatment was also discovered, and people began to think that if there was a bug, there'd be a pesticide to kill it. If there was a virus, there'd be a vaccine to avoid it. If there was an infection, there'd be an antibiotic to cure it. If there was a weed, there was an herbicide to eradicate it.
During the Victorian period, chemicals really became mainstream, with your local Pharmacist able to concoct anything and everything you could possibly need, from mercury treatments for syphilis, to blood letting to correct an imbalance of humors. In addition to this sort of treatment protocol change, farmers were experimenting with chemical fertilizers in place of good old fashioned green manures like mangelwurtzels and manure. It was a dawn of a new age, and as with anything that is new, mankind scrambled for the latest and greatest.
However, with this idea that there was always a pill to fix what ails you, Bio-security practices fell by the wayside. We became fearless. So... when something devastating came along, and no cure was readily available, it left people scared, terrified, confused, and angry. Why weren't their doctors able to prescribe something to cure AIDS? Why weren't doctors able to prescribe something to cure SARS? How come we don't have something that cures CANCER? Ebola? Lupus? Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease? As these diseases have come to light, the cry for a cure has grown louder, but no cure exists yet. What has the world prescribed for people who might contract these diseases?
Prevention. Avoid unprotected sex, don't travel to certain areas, better diet and exercise to avoid cancer, drink bottled water when on vacation, get a blood test and don't marry someone who has the same recessive gene for CJ disease... Thank goodness that prevention is coming in vogue again. But are we too late? Have our behaviors doomed us to a downward spiral, especially when it comes to PEDv?
I bet you were wondering when we'd get to something piggy related, lol! Bio-security practices are being treated as something new-fangled in the farming industry, when in all aspects, it practically developed there, with Rinderpest probably being the most notable. Cattle plague was easily transmittable through contaminated water and air. Farmers instituted a variety of bio-security practices from eradicating infected herds to strict isolation of healthy herds. No known vaccination existed that was truly 100 percent effective, and from before 3,000BC to 1999AD, intense Bio-security was really the only surefire method of keeping naive herds from contracting it. They started working on a vaccine in the 1700's, and it took nearly 200 years to come up with one that truly worked. The last known Rinderpest case was in Kenya in 2001, and in 2010, the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) declared that we were free of the disease on a global scale.
200 years. It took 200 years to develop a vaccine. Let's think about this for a moment. Vaccine development hasn't really changed all that much. The processes are very similar now to what they were when vaccines first came onto the scene. Identify a virus. Isolate virus. Duplicate virus. Identify antibodies in survivors. Isolate antibodies. Duplicate antibodies. Develop vehicle. Combine vehicle with antibodies. Inoculate naive sample. Test. Success goes towards production. Failure goes back to step 1.
Even if you look at what most would consider Modern Medicine, say... 1950 and up, many of the biggest diseases still have no known cure or vaccine. Prevention has been relabeled from a pill or shot to avoidance. Bio-Security has become the prevention of today.
But... PEDv is a big deal! And there are plenty of cases! And plenty of survivors! And plenty of antibodies! And plenty of affected cases! Why don't we have a vaccine yet?
Well, a few different reasons. One, say a University makes a breakthrough with some aspect of the virus. They're on that threshold of a major discovery and potentially a cure. Another University is also on that same threshold. If they shared information, someone would for certain develop that cure... But which one? Both Universities have invested time, money and effort in developing this cure, but only one will be known as the school that discovered it. Keeping this information close to breast is the best way they can figure to guarantee that their people get the credit. This slows down the process for everyone. Greed.
Another reason is that it's really difficult to stem the spread of an epidemic when every Tom, Dick and Harry is out there buying pigs and selling pigs without any concern for bio-security practices and travel logs. "Yeah, I delivered a truckload of 150 pigs from Nebraska to Ohio the other day." "Where'd those pigs originate?" "I dunno, just picked them up and trucked them." Greed.
SwineID is a program being worked on by the National Pork Board that would grant premises an identification number, and each pig would have accurate animal tracing through timely and accurate record keeping of its movements by producers. It's still elective at the moment.
Another reason is the, "I'm in this for ME," mentality. I've heard it time and time again this season. People are flat out unwilling to source local pigs from known PEDv negative farms, take a bit of a hit this year showing their animals, all in the name of ethical bio-security practices. They would rather risk everything to go into states that are PEDv positive, to farms that may or may not be affected, crossing areas that may or may not have the virus, playing the may or may not game, to get a pig they feel they can really compete with, all so they can get a big purple ribbon. Folks, that ribbon costs 3 dollars. In fact, you can buy a 4 foot long rosette for 12 dollars. Any color you want. Is that ribbon really worth risking the health and future of your herd? What about the breeding program of everyone else? Is that ribbon worth it? Sadly, for many, it is. Greed.
Greed is the primary reason it's going to take 5 years or more to develop a vaccine and cure, instead of 12 months.
Bio-security is the only thing we know that works. Stringent, unwavering bio-security. I'm not a gambler. Some people enjoy gambling. They enjoy that thrill of throwing the dice and seeing if the come up winning or snake eyes. I'm not one of those people. There will be a lot of those people at the fair though. The problem is, their losses will be everyone's losses. I pray it's not yours.
'Til next time, Carbolic Acid. That's goodbye in any language!
No comments:
Post a Comment