Good biosecurity keeps animals healthy at Oregon fairs, July 10

Oregon’s county fair season shifts into high gear over the next couple of weeks. Numerous shows, exhibitions, and competitions involving livestock are also on the schedule this summer. With these events comes a renewed effort to protect both animals and people from infectious disease. Whether that effort is directed at the exhibitor who brings the animals or the general public who attends, precautions are being prescribed to ensure a safe and enjoyable experience at all county fairs and other events over the next several weeks. In the first half of 2015, Oregon detected highly pathogenic avian influenza in backyard birds– likely spread by migratory waterfowl– and reported cases of a neurological form of Equine Herpes Virus (EHV-1). While those diseases appear to have subsided in Oregon, they serve as a reminder that good biosecurity can minimize the threat of infectious animal diseases during the fair and exhibition season. “The most effective way way to deal with animal diseases is to prevent animals from being exposed to them in the first place,” says Dr. Ryan Scholz, district veterinarian with the Oregon Department of Agriculture. “You are never going to prevent all risk, but biosecurity is a common sense approach that lessens the risk of your animals being exposed to diseases at the fair or show, and lessens the risk of taking those diseases back to your flocks or herds at home.”