Pathways for transfer and spreading of Aujeszky’s disease to carnivora

Aujeszky?s disease (Morbus Aujeszky) is an acute viral contagious disease occurring in a large number of domestic and wild animals. This epizootiological disease has been present in our country for quite some time now, and it has been increasingly frequently diagnosed in carnivora in the recent years. The objective of the investigations was to determine and establish the pathways for the transfer and the manner of spreading of the MA virus to carnivora. Epizootiological data on the appearance of MA, collected in the field, as well as an epizootiological report by the Serbian Ministry of Agriculture and of the Federal Ministry for Agriculture were used as material. Detailed epizootiological, clinical, pathomorphological, and laboratory analyses were performed in five critical spots for MA registered in the territory of Vojvodina province. We established the following pathways for the spread of the MA viral infection to carnivora: the consumption of thermally unprocessed swine carcasses, the consumption of thermally unprocessed pork originating from butcher shops or from regular slaughter on private farms, the consumption of viscera from emergency slaughtered sheep, cohabitation and contact with infected swine, and vaccination using a live vaccine contaminated with the MA virus.