Veterinary Education

Influenza Expert Gets Real About the H5N1 Risk to Your Swine Herd

Thu, 31 Oct 2024 22:11:28 GMT

Is influenza a greater concern to pigs and people in light of the Oct. 30 USDA announcement that H5N1 was detected for the first time ever in a pig from a backyard Oregon farm? If so, how?

Andrew Bowman, DVM, one of the country’s top swine influenza experts, joined The PORK Podcast to answer that question and more during a special report on H5N1. A professor in the Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine at The Ohio State University, he is well known for his expertise in swine production medicine, veterinary public health and epidemiology.

“Across the swine industry, we routinely deal with influenza, so we’re pretty well versed in flu,” Bowman says. “But this adds a whole other character to the scene that we really don’t want and reassorting with the flu viruses we already have.”

This isn’t just something that will go away, he adds. This is a topic that’s becoming a bigger issue across the ‘entire proverbial barnyard.”

“Poultry has been dealing with this problem for a while. Dairy, this year, has joined the influenza game. Pigs have had our own endemic strain. The idea that high-path might be affecting pigs as well, and even if not, is a good warning sign the threat is there,” he says.

It’s an important topic for the pork industry to think about, Bowman points out. Oregon might be miles from your farm, but the threat isn’t going away. So, how are you trying to keep diseases such as influenza out of your herd with biosecurity protocols?

“We need to work together. I don’t think there’s much finger pointing left in the flu world. We’re all on the same bus, and we need to figure out how we manage this,” Bowman says. “Granted, it will be different in different species, but this is a problem everyone’s having to deal with.”

Listen to the podcast here as Bowman tackles some of host Jennifer Shike’s questions after hearing USDA’s announcement.

Your Next Read: USDA Reports First H5N1 Detection in Swine

Why Students Should Apply for the 2025 Summer Veterinary Internship Program Now

Wed, 30 Oct 2024 22:13:43 GMT

The Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine (ISU CVM) is seeking veterinary student applicants for summer 2025 swine, bovine and poultry internship positions.

Will Fombelle, DVM, is a veteran of several internships spread across his undergraduate studies in animal sciences and also into his veterinary school education. During the summer of 2012, he completed the Swine Veterinary Internship Program (SVIP).

“While in school, I took on the attitude of completing as many internships as I possibly could in order to not only narrow down my career choice but also my future employer. By participating in these programs, I was able to mold my interests into the fields of swine medicine and production which greatly accelerated my vision of where I chose to start my career in veterinary medicine at Carthage Veterinary Service,” he said in a previous PorkBusiness.com article .

Participants in the SVIP collaborate with a mentoring veterinarian or team of veterinarians at a production system or practice. Students are immersed in modern swine production and health daily and take the lead on designing and executing a field trial with guidance from mentors, ISU CVM said on its website . Students also take part in diagnostic test sampling and implement the principles and methods of swine diagnostic collection, testing and interpretation.

“Even if your university has classes well into the summer, you have a study abroad trip planned, a wedding or another reason you might not be able to commit to the entire 12 weeks, go ahead and apply,” ISU CVM encouraged. “Just note your availability in the section where it asks about conflicts. We can’t guarantee we can accommodate all schedules but if a student is selected we will try our hardest to be flexible and make it work.”

Applications are due Dec. 1, 2024 (late applications are accepted but higher priority will be given to those received by Dec. 1).

Apply here.

“These summer internships are the first exposure for students to the real world, and we should do our best to make each student’s experience a positive one,” Fombelle wrote.

Learn more here.

Your Next Read: Find and Develop Your Replacement in the Pork Industry

Top 10 Veterinary Colleges Announced

Thu, 04 Nov 2021 21:03:18 GMT

If you and friends enjoy bantering about which college of veterinary medicine is best, a new report will simply add more fuel to your conversational fire.

London-based Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) announced its inaugural ranking of the world’s best veterinary colleges in March. At No. 1 globally is the University of California-Davis. Two additional U.S.-based schools round out the top 10, with the remaining seven located in Canada, Denmark, Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom (UK), respectively. See the complete listing below.

QS says the rankings are based on four factors: academic reputation, employer reputation, research citations and H-index. The latter, QS says, “is a way of measuring both the productivity and impact of the published work of a scientist or scholar.”

QS bills itself as the “world’s leading provider of services, analytics and insight to the global higher education sector.” The rankings were announced in partnership with Elsevier, a Dutch publishing and analytics company. More information on the methodology is available at topuniversities.com.

Top 10 Veterinary Colleges
#1. University of California-Davis

#2. University of London-UK

#3. Cornell University

#4. Utrecht University-Netherlands

#5. University of Guelph-Canada

#6. University of Edinburgh-UK

#7. University of Cambridge-UK

#8. Michigan State University (tie)

#8. Vets Faculty-Switzerland (tie)

#10. University of Copenhagen-Denmark

Other U.S. schools QS says are of interest:

The Ohio State University
University of Minnesota
University of Pennsylvania
Colorado State University
North Carolina State University
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Iowa State University

Veterinary Education

Influenza Expert Gets Real About the H5N1 Risk to Your Swine Herd

Why Students Should Apply for the 2025 Summer Veterinary Internship Program Now

Top 10 Veterinary Colleges Announced

Texas Tech Adds Large-Animal Veterinarian To Staff