It seems to be a week of news, on both sides of the border, for transmissable livestock diseases.
Scrapie is a fatal, degenerative disease affecting the central nervous system of sheep and goats. It is among a number of diseases classified as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSE) and very similar to BSE (mad cow disease) found in cattle.
A fatal disease that affects sheep and goats has been confirmed at a quarantined sheep farm in eastern Ontario.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency says scrapie (SKRAY’-pee) was confirmed in a sheep that recently died on the farm.
The agency says there is no human health risk associated with scrapie.
However, the CFIA aims to eradicate it from Canada as the disease has serious impacts on sheep.
It said in a weekend release that the farm was placed under quarantine because a sheep that originated from there had previously tested positive for scrapie.
Ontario Provincial Police are investigating the removal earlier this month of 31 sheep from the same farm in violation of the quarantine order.
See: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/
