Six months after the first case of swine fever in Hesse, the situation remains difficult. The disease is rampant in several districts, and almost 600 infected animals have been found. The fight against the virus will take years, an expert predicts.
It has been six months since African swine fever (ASF) was first detected in Hesse. On June 15, the Friedrich Loeffler Institute for Animal Health confirmed the positive result in a dead wild boar. It had previously been discovered near Rüsselsheim in the Groß-Gerau district.
Now also in the Rheingau-Taunus district
Since then, the disease has continued to spread in Hesse. By December 13th, 578 infected wild boars were reported in four districts and in Darmstadt, most of them 305 in the Bergstrasse district. And the situation remains dynamic.
The findings in the Rheingau-Taunus district, which until last week were considered free of swine fever, show how far Hesse is from an all-clear. Most recently, three dead wild boars infected with ASF were found on the Rhine island of Marianneaue. The animals are good swimmers.
Exclusion zone recently expanded
In a statement at the weekend, the Ministry of Agriculture expressly warned against the spread of the disease along the Rhine. According to the current findings, exclusion zone II was expanded again with a ban on hunting and restrictions on breeding.
Current swine fever protection zones
Fighting the epidemic is “not a sprint, but a marathon,” the ministry emphasizes, emphasizing the long-term nature of the task. Veterinarian and geneticist Gerald Reiner sees it similarly. He is head of the clinic for pigs, livestock medicine and molecular diagnostics at the Justus Liebig University in Giessen.
Expert: “We’ll have to live with it for several years”
Reiner has been working on African swine fever for several years. “I think we have to live with it somehow,” he says, “at least for several years.” According to the expert, the virus came to Georgia in 2007 in contaminated food on a ship from Africa.
“It’s still active throughout Eastern Europe,” says Reiner. From there it was probably through people who worked here, such as harvest workers, whose provisions came to Brandenburg in 2020 and, independently, to Hesse in 2024.
“This is the sword of Damocles that hovers over all of Germany,” says Reiner. “We cannot say whether a new outbreak will take place tomorrow in Lower Saxony and the day after tomorrow in Bavaria and so on.”
Exclusion zones, fences, cadaver trials
Limiting ASF has been a top priority since the first fund, the ministry makes clear and lists a number of measures to achieve this: setting up exclusion zones, erecting fences, carrying out cadaver tests with the help of drones and dogs.
The virus is actually difficult to transmit, explains veterinarian Reiner. For an infection, tissue such as blood, a carcass or contaminated food such as meat and sausage is required. According to the FLI, pig feces can also be infectious.
Carcasses remain infectious for a long time
If a wild boar dies from ASF, the carcass lies somewhere in the forest and fields. “They then bleed from the nose, the anus and the eyes.” Other pigs approach, sniff, are curious. “If such contact occurs, a pig can become infected again.”
Two of them promote the spread: Firstly, the carcass is infectious for a very long time. It is therefore important to rescue dead animals as quickly as possible. On the other hand, an infected pig can survive for several days. It is therefore important that it does not travel long distances during this time and does not carry the virus to other regions.
The population is also challenged
The rules of conduct in exclusion zone II come into play here. “It is crucial that we as a society remain vigilant,” said Agriculture Minister Ingmar Jung (CDU), calling on the population. “This is the only way we can prevent the disease from spreading further.”
In concrete terms, this means: stay on the paths and keep dogs on a leash so as not to alarm any animals. In exclusion zone II, hunting is prohibited; leisure activities such as mushroom picking or geocaching off the beaten track are taboo.
Fences cut up living spaces
Reiner admits that fences help combat swine fever, but also points to possible harmful effects on other animal species. Their habitats are already severely fragmented by roads and settlements. In addition, not all wild boars would be stopped by the sometimes delicate fences.
He believes that the use of live traps, so-called pig traps, in infected areas is consistently effective. In these wooden structures, which are around two meters high, entire groups are lured using bait in order to shoot them because the animals could potentially be dangerous. “That seems to be working quite well.”
People indirectly affected
ASF only affects pigs because only their cells have the appropriate receptors that the virus can attach to. For them, an infection always quickly ends in death. From a medical point of view, swine fever is completely harmless for other animals such as dogs and cats, but also for people.
Nevertheless, their occurrence has serious economic and social consequences. Pig farmers are particularly affected by this. If ASF is detected in even one animal in a herd, all pigs on the farm must be culled, i.e. killed. So far, nine cases of ASF in domestic pigs have been reported in Hesse.
Pig farmer: “That really hurt”
One person who was affected is Rainer Roth from Riedstadt (Groß-Gerau). “That really hurt a lot,” says the pig farmer. With a lot of money, work and emotion, he tried to give his around 170 pigs an acceptable life. “And then something like that is simply thrown away,” he mourns the animals.
The disease also causes problems for many pig farmers whose livestock is not directly affected by ASF, for example if their farm is in exclusion zone II. There are hardly any slaughterhouses in Germany that are allowed to slaughter these pigs. A larger slaughterhouse with the appropriate permit is located hundreds of kilometers away in Schleswig-Holstein.
Barely Battle options and bad picture
But long transport routes mean more animal suffering and high costs. Small businesses in particular do not have the quantities to fully utilize the trucks, explains breeder Susanne Ries from Münster (Darmstadt-Dieburg). And pigs from the exclusion zone are not allowed to be mixed with others. In Modautal (Darmstadt-Dieburg), a new small slaughterhouse has been providing some relief for a few weeks now.
And then there is the image problem, which makes sales difficult for the affected pig farmers. Retailers often don't want to buy animals from exclusion zone II, says Ries. “But these are the most studied animals at the moment,” she explains. If you want to be guaranteed to eat ASF-free meat, you have to buy meat from the exclusion zone.
Ministry points to initial successes
Such notes make the urgency of the problem clear. After all: the ministry points to initial successes. The EU Commission has approved the partial lifting of exclusion zone III rings around domestic pig herds affected by ASF. This is evidence of successful disease control, says Minister Jung.
But nothing is on display yet. Expert Reiner is now concerned with preventing wild boars from migrating from affected regions and keeping their density low through targeted hunting. Good successes have been achieved with this in Belgium and the Czech Republic.
