Changes are happening at Animal Health Canada (AHC), which announced updates, including work on training and response programs and additions to Emergency Management Division (EMD) staff.
AHC EMD Director Erica Charlton delivered updates at the recent AHC 2024 Annual Forum in Ottawa.
Depopulation training
Charlton mentioned a new depopulation training project which is underway in partnership with ACER consulting. “This will help inform a Canadian training program that we’re going to develop with ACER,” she said.
AHC has a workshop scheduled for early November with international experts presenting on best practices, which will also help inform the Canadian training program. “It’s been opened up beyond the swine sector to include other livestock sectors because depopulation has a lot of similarities.”
Working with fairs and exhibitions
“In mid-summer, with the [avian influenza] outbreak still raging in the U.S., we thought we’d better get in front of folks that do fairs and exhibitions,” Charlton said.
Following this, AHC worked with other groups like the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), Dairy Farmers of Canada and others “to very quickly turn around and produce biosecurity recommendations for fairs and exhibition audiences.” The information was then put up online and shared through organizations like 4-H Canada.
Division expansion
Charlton introduced the new members of the ED team: Michelle Follensbee, emergency management project manager, will focus on the wild pig file and ASF exercise planning, Dr. Afolakemi (Kemi) Adeniji, emergency management project lead and liaison on CanSpotASF committees for ASF surveillance, Kori Maki-Adair, the EM Division coordinator, working on division administration, and Temidayo Adewole, Project Manager and videographer.
ASF Mock exercises
AHC is moving forward with mock exercises to prepare for outbreaks of African Swine Fever (ASF). “As the sector creates ASF preparedness plans, we owe it to ourselves to test them through mock exercises.”
Several exercises happened over the past year, Charlton said. They were either hosted by AHC or by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture (CFA) with AHC in attendance.
FMD Integrated Emergency Response Plan
Another item Charlton gave an update on was the foot and mouth disease (FMD) Integrated Emergency Response Plan (IERP).
“This work will focus on clarifying, helping and finding roles and responsibilities for federal, provincial and territorial governments and industry partners in the event and before an animal disease outbreak,” she said. “To do this, we’ve recently struck a number of smaller committees and discussions.”
AHC also has some related exercises planned for Nov. 25.
Source: Farmtario
