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The Risks Agricultural emergencies can include:
Food safety and water contamination are addressed on other pages of this website. This page will focus on examples of animal diseases. |
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Agricultural Diseases
Animal diseases can do a great deal more than temporarily affect livestock production. Outbreaks of a disease can require the destruction of all animals in the affected herd. They can also disrupt international trade if trading partners close their borders to eliminate the potential spread of a disease. Widespread crop damage due to disease can affect the reliability and security of our food supply. This results in serious economic hardship in our agricultural industry.
Some examples of animal disease are:
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE)
This disease is also known as Mad Cow Disease because infected animals begin to stagger and act in strange ways in the latter stages of the disease. BSE damages the brain and central nervous system of infected cows and eventually results in death. When a BSE outbreak is detected, herds are quarantined and tested; infected animals are destroyed to prevent further spread. In recent years, when an outbreak has been detected in Canada, the American government has closed its border and not allowed Canadian cattle or beef exports to enter the U.S. This has had a devastating economic effect on Canadian cattle farming.
Hoof and Mouth Disease
Hoof and Mouth disease is a highly contagious and sometimes fatal viral disease in cattle and pigs. It can also infect other cloven-hoofed animals such as goats, sheep, deer, elk, bison, etc. It is widespread throughout the world and is endemic in parts of Asia, Africa, the Middle East and South America. It is highly contagious among animals, but cannot be spread from animals to people. There is a similar disease called Hand and Mouth Disease which infects people. It spread by a virus that is closely related to the one which causes hoof and mouth disease, but people do not catch it from animals. There hasn't been an outbreak in Canada since 1952, and quarantine procedures applied to livestock imports and exports help to control the spread of the disease.
Newcastle Disease
Newcastle disease is caused by strains of a highly infectious virus that affects poultry as well as populations of wild birds. Domestic birds usually contract it by contact with infected wild birds. If a lethal strain of the virus infects birds in a highly concentrated poultry farming area, it can spread rapidly and produce very high mortality rates in the birds.
For more information on animal diseases visit the Canadian Food Inspection Agency website.
