Fourteen carcasses of dead wild boar with two suspected positive cases for swine fever. After the first case found in the capital on May 5th the suspected cases still come from the Insugherata park. As explained by the Lazio region, the 14 ungulate carcasses found in the Rome area are all negative and are all within the Grande Raccordo Anulare. The cases refer to the same area as case 0 with the samples sent to the Zooprophylactic Institute of Perugia for definitive confirmation, where they expect the final results from. The same "infected area" defined as "provisional" within the municipality of Rome is therefore confirmed, that is the one identified by the "operational group of experts" which has been working to verify the presence since May 5, after the first case recorded in an ungulate coming from the Insugherata reserve, of animals affected by African swine fever.
The Lazio region took steps to establish the consequent measures to be taken with a special order signed on 7 May by the president Nicola Zingaretti. The provision is aimed precisely at determining "the first regulatory measures for the containment of African swine fever in the Lazio area". The disease, which is not transmissible to humans, after the cases in Emilia Romagna and Liguria, risks spreading also in the region governed by Zingaretti. A series of measures have been put in place to contain this risk.
Possible new suspected cases of swine fever in relation to which the declaration of the head of cabinet of the Lazio region Andrea Napolitano arrived, who said to the Tgr Lazio: that "Undersecretary Costa underlined the need for depopulation and therefore for selective killing . So in Rome this will have to be done to create an area of void and not allow this epidemic to spread ”. Killing of wild boars that found the animal rights protesters: “The citizens of Rome do not want the problem of the raids of some wild boars in the inhabited center caused by the waste emergency, and only by that, to be solved with blood. Now another excuse to invoke blood is some small case of swine fever, not transmissible to humans ", explain in no uncertain terms from theinternational organization for the protection of animals (Oipa).
African swine fever (PSA) "cannot be fought by sending hunters to kill wild boars as reported today by Undersecretary of Health Andrea Costa", reports Oipa. On the contrary, as an opinion asked of experts by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) attests, "hunting is not an effective tool to reduce the size of the wild boar population in Europe". More: "the hunters, with their evisceration practices, they can spread in an uncontrolled way the Psa virus, harmless to humans, and other pathogens that the prey could be carriers of ". The main cause of the increase in the presence of wild boars in Rome "is the age-old waste emergency, which has become very serious in recent years", underlines Rita Corboli, delegate of OIPA in Rome, "the wild boars are always the same, but in recent years waste and open landfills have increased and therefore the availability of food in the vicinity of the green areas where they live.
Rome is the greenest city in Europe rich in wildlife, which should be considered a resource to be managed with respect for life and not an enemy to fight ". Oipa therefore hopes that the question will be addressed "in a rational, scientific way", and "a serious surveillance and prevention plan can be implemented not by arming hunters, even by deregulating their activity, but by monitoring the health of dead animals in the national territory". Making of Rome “a Far West to kill wild boars does not solve the problem, quite the contrary: scientific studies affirm that the killing is followed by a multiplication of litters ", concludes Corboli," in Rome the problem is waste, not wild boars "(Rome Today).