TREATMENT AND PREVENTION OF PORCINE PROLIFERATIVE ENTEROPATHY WITH ORAL TIAMULIN

The effect of an oral treatment or prevention programme, incorporating the antibiotic tiamulin, on the development of proliferative enteropa thy in experimentally challenged pigs was studied, Twenty weaner pigs were challenged orally with virulent inoculum of Lawsonia intracellula ris strain LR189/5/83, a British isolate of the causative agent of por cine proliferative enteropathy, and seven control pigs were dosed with a buffer solution, Seven of the 20 challenged pigs were left untreate d; they gained less weight than the controls and three of them develop ed mild to moderate diarrhoea two weeks after the challenge, All seven developed lesions, six visible grossly, of proliferative enteropathy, and numerous intracellular L intracellularis were detected in section s of the intestines examined three weeks after the challenge, To test a 'prevention' dosing strategy for tiamulin, six of the challenged pig s were dosed orally with 50 ppm tiamulin, incorporated in a 2 per cent stabilised premix, given from two days before the challenge until the y were euthanased. To test a 'treatment' strategy, the remaining group of seven challenged pigs were dosed orally with 150 ppm tiamulin give n in the premix from seven days after challenge until they were euthan ased, All the control pigs and the 13 pigs treated with tiamulin, eith er before or after challenge, remained clinically normal and had no sp ecific lesions of proliferative enteropathy in sections of the intesti nes examined post mortem.