MANAGEMENT, CONTROL AND REGULATIONS

Preventive control and management measures should aim to decrease interfaces between livestock, wildlife and humans so that the disease risk in both livestock and free- ranging/captive wildlife is reduced and the zoonotic poten­tial minimized.

I f brucellosis occurs in a herd or flock, national and international veterinary regulations impose restrictions on animal movements and trade, which result in huge eco­nomic losses.

There is no vaccine currently available and registered for wildlife. In bison, elk and reindeer, the cattle S19 and RB51 vaccine strains have not shown satisfactory results in terms of safety and efficacy. Moreover, the isolation of these vaccine strains in feral pigs highlights that before any prospective use of a brucellosis vaccine in wildlife, the release of such vaccines has to be fully investigated, par­ticularly in non-target species⁽¹⁰⁾.

The control of brucellosis in wildlife relies mainly, if not exclusively, on good management practices. As dramati­cally shown in the GYA, elk (considered to be dead-end hosts when ranging freely) are becoming maintenance hosts for B. abortus when winter feeding is practised⁽⁸⁾. As a general rule, management practices enhancing the wildlife/livestock interface should not be implemented.

In Europe, brucellosis in terrestrial wildlife is nowadays restricted to B. suis biovar 2 infections in wild boars and hares. Given the ecology and the geographical distribution of wild boar in Europe, B. suis biovar 2 infection in wild boar could become of major concern should brucellosis control programmes in domestic pigs be implemented in the EU.