RISKS AND ECONOMIC CONSEQUENCES OF INTRODUCING CLASSICAL SWINE FEVER INTO THE NETHERLANDS BY FEEDING SWILL TO SWINE

An effective animal disease prevention and eradication programme is of great importance for meat-exporting countries such as the Netherlands . If a serious outbreak of disease were to occur, the eradication meas ures required by the European Union and a possible ban on meat exports would have severe economic consequences. However, historical and expe rimental information on which these programmes can he based is scarce. Furthermore, until recently, an integrated approach which combined th e various aspects of outbreaks and risks with economic consequences wa s lacking. This paper describes a project based on such an integrated approach. The project covered the elicitation of expert knowledge and the development of the virus introduction risk simulation model (VIRiS ), VIRiS integrates objective and subjective information concerning ri sks and consequences of virus introduction, and thus presents policy-m akers with a useful tool for the evaluation of existing prevention pro grammes and possible alternatives. VIRiS is illustrated for classical swine fever. A comparison is made between the current situation and a hypothetical situation where the risk factor 'swill feeding' is comple tely eliminated.