Monday, May 22, 2017

More farms released from TB quarantine

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has released another five premises from quarantines that were established to prevent the spread of tuberculosis among cattle herds in Alberta and Southwestern Saskatchewan.

That brings the total released to 69 and lowers the number remaining under quarantine to 35 with about 5,700 cattle.

The quarantines began last fall when one cow shipped for slaughter in the United States was detected as infected with a strain of tuberculosis never before seen in Canada.

Six more Canadian cattle, all from the same operation in Alberta, were subsequently identified as infected. That entire herd of about 10,500 cattle on 18 premises has been slaughtered.

The quarantines were applied to any premise that has cattle that were at any time in contact with the herd where the disease was confirmed.


The quarantines have been a major disruption for the farm operations because they have not been able to move any animals off their premises and travel to and from their farms and ranches is tightly controlled.