Repopulation of pig holdings following disease outbreaks
Article 13
1
The reintroduction of pigs to holdings referred to in Article 5 shall not take place until at least 40 days after completion of the cleansing, disinfection and, if necessary, disinsectisation operations in the holding in question in accordance with paragraphs 2 to 5 of this Article.
2
The reintroduction of pigs shall take account of the type of farming practised on the holding concerned, and shall conform to one of the procedures set out in paragraphs 3 and 4.
3
In the case of holdings where the occurrence of disease has not been linked to vectors, the following procedure shall apply:
a
as regards open-air holdings, the reintroduction of pigs shall start with the introduction of sentinel pigs which have been checked and found negative for the presence of antibodies against African swine fever virus or which come from holdings not subjected to any restrictions related to African swine fever. The sentinel pigs shall be placed, in accordance with the requirements of the competent authority, throughout the infected holding and shall be sampled 45 days later, and shall be tested for the presence of antibodies, in accordance with the diagnostic manual. No pig may leave the holding before the negative results of the serological tests are available; if none of the pigs has developed antibodies against African swine fever virus, full repopulation may then take place;
b
as regards all other forms of rearing, the reintroduction of pigs shall either take place in accordance with the measures provided for in point (a) or shall be based on total repopulation, provided that:
- all the pigs arrive within a period of 20 days and come from holdings not subjected to any restrictions related to African swine fever,
- pigs in the repopulated herd shall be subjected to a serological examination in accordance with the diagnostic manual. Sampling for that examination shall be carried out at the earliest 45 days after the arrival of the last pigs,
- no pig may leave the holding before the negative results of the serological examination are available.
4
In the case of holdings where the occurrence of disease has been linked to vectors, restocking shall not take place for at least six years unless:
a
specific operations to eliminate the vector from the premises and places where the pigs are to be kept or can come into contact with the vector have been successfully carried out under official supervision, or
b
it has been possible to show that the persistence of the vector no longer represents a significant risk of African swine fever being transmitted.
Thereafter, the measures laid down in paragraph 3(a) shall apply.
In addition to those measures, however, no pig may leave the holding in question after full repopulation until further serological examinations for African swine fever have been carried out with negative results on samples collected from the pigs in the holding at the earliest 60 days after full repopulation, in accordance with the diagnostic manual.
5
Where the occurrence of disease has not been linked to vectors, and if more than six months have elapsed since the completion of the cleansing and disinfection operations in the holding, the competent authority may authorise derogation from paragraph 3, taking into account the epidemiological situation.
6
The reintroduction of domestic animals of species other than pigs to the holdings described in Article 5 shall be subject to authorisation by the competent authority, which shall take account of the risk of spreading the infection or of the persistence of vectors presented by such reintroduction.