Today, Finnish Food Authority experts will be training around 100 volunteer hunters to search for dead wild boars in the African swine fever- infected zone in Southeast Finland. The aim is to find all possible dead wild boars and their carcasses in the terrain and deliver them to the Finnish Food Authority’s laboratory for testing for African swine fever.
The We hunt programme is being used to assist in the search. It allows a hunter to immediately supply the coordinates of the site where they have found something to other searchers and also to take photos that can be shared via the programme.
The terrain is being systematically swept in a specially designed manner. If dead wild boars are found during the search, the carcasses will be collected in a disease-safe manner and samples will be taken for ASF testing. The carcasses will be disposed of appropriately so that there is no risk of the disease spreading.
The Finnish Food Authority’s facilities at the Vaalimaa border are being used as the local disease control centre for the search activities. All activities related to the search for carcasses and sampling in the zones will be centralised there. One or more state veterinarians from the Veterinary Care Regional Unit will be present at least at the beginning. It will be determined later how long the state veterinarian will be on site when the situation becomes clearer as the search progresses.
In accordance with their own division of labour, state veterinarians and the heads of divisions with a veterinary background will lead the activities on site, take samples of any carcasses found and ensure biosecurity in all activities, manage the related administration and coordinate the activities in their entirety on site.
Additional information
Search for dead wild boar and other local disease control measures:
Matti Nyberg
Head of Unit
Veterinary Care Regional Unit.
tel. +358 40 501 8464
matti.nyberg@ruokavirasto.fi
Other ASF related issues:
Terhi Laaksonen
Director of Department
Animal Health and Welfare Department
tel. +358 40 159 5812
terhi.laaksonen@ruokavirasto.fi