DA to recommend free ASF vaccines if tests successful

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Agriculture (DA) will recommend to the national government the free roll out of African Swine Fever (ASF) vaccines for the country’s entire hog inventory if ongoing tests turn out successful.

“If this testing will be successful, we will recommend to the government to buy all the vaccines so that all will be vaccinated,” Agriculture Secretary William Dar said in an interview on PTV-4.

“Today, we only have about 9.7 million hogs present in the country, so I hope the government will shoulder the expenses in buying and in the vaccination process in the future,” he said.

In April, the DA announced that the Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) was collaborating with an unidentified US vaccine company and global animal healthcare company Zoetis for the vaccine trials.

It said ASF vaccine trials would be conducted and monitored by the DA-BAI personnel and veterinarians for 84 days, in line with the current protocols set by the government technical working group, the vaccine manufacturer and Zoetis Philippines Inc.

Dar said the testing of two potential ASF vaccines is ongoing.

He said the initial results of the trials are set to be released by the end of the month.

“So from the initial results, we will still need to evaluate because there’s still a phase two testing,”Dar said.

He said there would still be a third phase of testing, wherein the vaccine will be tested on the virus present in live hogs.

Dar said all the three phases of testing would be conducted within the year.

“So before the end of the year, there will be a decision whether to go ahead, if these vaccines are a success or consider other ways forward,” Dar said.

“If the results of these two vaccines are successful, even if we are just able to use one of the vaccines, we will recommend to the national government, to President Duterte,” Dar said.

Based on the Philippines’ report to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) as of July 5, ASF has spread to 12 regions, 50 provinces, 541 cities/municipalities, and 2,836 barangays in the country.

In the same month, Dar declared six areas in the province of Batangas as free from ASF. Among these are the towns of Malvar, Nasugbu, Rosario, San Jose and Taysan and Lipa City.

Apart from the potential ASF vaccines, Dar said that other measures would be needed to curb the spread of ASF such as the implementation of cluster hog raising and intensified biosecurity measures.