The evolution of African swine fever (ASF) in Europe and our country

African swine fever (ASF) is a viral infectious disease specific to domestic and wild swine of all ages, highly contagious and very serious, probably the most dangerous and damaging disease of pigs, able to produce in new outbreaks of domestic swine fever a mortality of up to 100%. This disease is produced by a deoxyribovirus of the genus Asfavirus , the family of Asfaviridae with at least 22 different genomic types. In Europe, the disease was first reported in 1957 in Portugal, around Lisbon. Although the first outbreaks were declared eradicated, in 1960 others appeared when the disease spread to Spain and after that it could not be eradicated until 1990, after great efforts and huge losses. ASF was also reported in other European countries as: France (1964), Italy (1967), Malta (1978), Belgium (1985), The Netherlands (1986). Of all this, ASF could be eradicated by extremely drastic and costly measures, except in Sardinia, where it would seem to persist in today's endemic form. In the middle of 2007 this disease appeared in countries of the former Soviet Union and in the Czech Republic, then in 2016 in Poland, in 2017 in Romania, Hungary and Belgium. In 2018 ASF spread in Bulgaria and Italy. The updated map of European Union outbreaks of swine fever in the European Union shows that Romania is the country most affected by the virus, with almost half of the counties in the red zone - officially discovered pests.