Identification of Risk Factors for African Swine Fever: A Systematic Review.

African swine fever (ASF) is an internationally-spreading viral pig disease that severely damages agricultural pork production and trade economy as well as social welfare in disease-affected regions. A comprehensive understanding of ASF risk factors is imperative for efficient disease control. As the absence of effective ASF vaccines limits disease management options, the identification and minimisation of ASF-associated risk factors is critical to preventing ASF outbreaks. Here, we compile currently known potential ASF risk factors identified through a systematic literature review. We found 154 observation-based and 1239 potential ASF risk factors, which we were able to group into the following defined risk categories: 'ASF-virus', 'Biosecurity', 'Disease control', 'Environment', 'Husbandry', 'Movement', 'Network', 'Pig', 'Society' and 'Surveillance'. Throughout the epidemiological history of ASF there have been similar risk categories, such as 'Environment'-related risk factors, predominantly reported in the literature irrespective of the ASF situation at the time. While ASF risk factor reporting has markedly increased since 2010, the majority of identified risk factors overall have referred to domestic pigs. The reporting of risk factors for ASF in wild boar mostly commenced from 2016 onwards. The compendium of ASF risk factors presented herein defines our current knowledge of ASF risk factors, and critically informs ASF-related problem solving.

[Modeling of the financial reserves required by the livestock disease compensation fund of Lower Saxony for rebates in the course of disease outbreaks incorporating spatial restriction zones]. / Modellierung der für Kompensationen im Zusammenhang mit Tierseuchenausbrüchen erforderlichen finanziellen Rücklagen der Niedersächsischen Tierseuchenkasse unter Berücksichtigung räumlicher Restriktionszonen.

One of the tasks of the livestock disease compensation funds of the federal states in Germany is the financial compensation of livestock holders for livestock losses and costs incurred for disease control measures due to certain diseases. Usually, one half of these services are financed through financial reserves built up with the contributions paid by the owners of the respective animal species. The other half is covered by the federal state itself. But there is hardly any reference to how to calculate aforementioned financial reserves. Basically, following an approach presented recently regarding estimations concerning the compensation fund of the federal state of Saxony-Anhalt, in a stochastic modeling of the required reserves concerning the fund of Lower Saxony the anticipated costs within the spatial restriction zones allocated to outbreaks were incorporated for the first time. The overall costs (including the federal state's stakes), the share of the comnensation fund (required reserves) and the the partial costs for a total of 25 categories and subcategories and subcategories of livestock species making up the latter were estimated. It became evident that overall costs/the share of the fund were particularly determined among the diseases by foot-and-mouth disease and among the cost factors by the costs incurred for the compensation of livestock value within the areas surrounding the outbreaks in which all susceptible animals are killed (culling zone). The 80th, 90 and 95th percentile of the established probability distribution of the overall costs referred to a financial volume of about 312, 409 and 540 million euro, while the respective percentiles of the probability distribution of the required reserves of the compensation fund amounted to 175, 225 and 296 million euro.

[Estimation of the financial reserves required by livestock disease compensation funds for rebates in the course of disease outbreaks using the example of Saxony-Anhalt (Germany)]. / Abschätzung der für Kompensationen im Zusammenhang mit Tierseuchenausbrüchen erforderlichen finanziellen Rücklagen einer Tierseuchenkasse am Beispiel Sachsen-Anhalts.

With certain restrictions, the federal states of Germany are obligated to financially compensate livestock owners for animal losses due to livestock diseases. If livestock disease compensation funds demand contributions from livestock owners for certain species in order to pay compensations, the federal states have to pay only one half of the rebate. The remaining 50% has to be financed through reserves of the respective compensation fund built up with the contributions. But there is no reference on how to calculate such financial reserves. Therefore, for the livestock disease compensation fund of Saxony-Anhalt (Germany), an attempt was made to estimate the required reserves.To this end, expert opinions concerning the expected number of affected holdings in potential outbreaks of different diseases were collected. In a conservative approach, assuming these diseases occur in parallel within a single year, overall costs as well as individual costs for altogether 25 categories and subcategories of livestock species were stochastically modeled.The 99.9th percentile of the resulting frequency distribution of the overall costs referred to a financial volume of about 23 million euro. Thus, financial reserves of 11,5 million euro were recommended to the livestock disease compensation fund.