The Danish pig health scheme: Nation-wide computer-based abattoir surveillance and follow-up at the herd level

In 1978 an agreement was made among the Danish authorities, the slaughterhouse association and the pig produces to develop and operate a national swine herd health scheme based on data from the routine slaughter inspection.This review of the health scheme first presents available evidence of the diagnostic validity of slaughter inspection data in terms of correlation with clinical history and with detailed post-mortem findings of internal organs. The epidemiological basis for the program further includes the use of slaughter inspection findings in estimating the poor beneficial effects of medical treatment procedures in common, multifactorial disorders, their considerable variation within and among herds of different sizes, their correlation with environmental and managerial herd factors, and some obvious associations among different clinical pictures of these economically important herd health problems.Finally, an overview is presented of the current program, its design and operation, and preliminary results from its first few years of operations are given.