Ovine Respiratory Disease: A Pathway to Prevention

肺部感染是绵羊和羔羊死亡和疾病的主要原因之一，尽管有一种疫苗可以对抗被认为是疾病主要原因的细菌。这种疾病会影响羊的健康和福利，但也会降低生产力，并可能通过减缓生长速度，增加屠宰时间和过早死亡来增加养羊业对环境的影响。该项目旨在支持农民和兽医减少他们所照顾的羊的肺病。我们将增加对这种疾病的知识和了解，使那些与羊打交道的人能够做出基于证据的决定，以减少病例数量。这将有助于提高动物福利，农场盈利能力和效率，并将减少抗菌剂的使用。在这个为期一年的项目中，我们将更新开发更好解决方案所需的基本信息。养羊户将通过建立的农民团体（放牧团体）参与该项目，并将与研究人员合作评估科学发现并将其纳入他们农场的背景中。除了从农民那里获得关于他们的羊群和疫苗使用情况的信息外，我们还将从参与农民的农场上死亡的任何绵羊中收集肺样本。我们还将从提交给英国兽医监测实验室网络的绵羊中收集样本。使用Moredun Research最近完成的研究中存档的绵羊肺样本将使实验室研究从项目开始时就开始。这些绵羊样本将被用来找出哪些生物体是目前导致绵羊肺部疾病的最重要的生物体。这些微生物可能直接导致肺损伤，或通过降低动物免疫反应的有效性使动物易患疾病。对重要微生物的进一步了解将表明目前出售的羊肺炎疫苗是否针对正确的病原体。研究人员和农民将共同努力，加深对绵羊呼吸道疾病的了解。这种伙伴关系将允许共同开发实用的、用户友好的干预措施，从而可能迅速改善绵羊和羔羊的健康。这些信息将与更广泛的绵羊养殖和兽医界分享。我们设想这项为期一年的研究作为第一步，回答立即改善所需的重要问题，并使我们能够在未来开发更雄心勃勃和创新的方法来控制绵羊肺病。

Lung infections are one of the main causes of death and illness in sheep and lambs despite there being a vaccine available against the bacteria believed to be the main causes of the disease. This disease impacts on the health and welfare of sheep but it also reduces productivity and potentially adds to the environmental impact of sheep farming through slowed growth, increased time to slaughter, and premature death.This project aims to support farmers and vets to reduce lung disease in the sheep they care for. We will increase knowledge and understanding of the disease, allowing those working with sheep to make evidence-based decisions to reduce the number of cases. This will help improve animal welfare, farm profitability and efficiency and will reduce antimicrobial usage. In this 1-year project we will update the basic information needed to develop better solutions.Sheep farmers will be involved in this project throughout via established farmer groups (grazing groups) and will work in partnership with researchers to assess the scientific findings and place them into context on their farms. In addition to information from farmers about their flocks and their vaccine usage, we will also collect lung samples from any sheep that die on the farms of the participating farmers. We will also collect samples from sheep submitted to the UK veterinary surveillance network of laboratories. The use of archived sheep lung samples from research studies which have been completed recently by the Moredun Research will allow the laboratory studies to begin right from the start of the project. These sheep samples will be used to find out which organisms are currently the most important in causing lung disease in sheep. These organisms may directly cause the damage to the lung or may predispose the animal to disease by decreasing the effectiveness of their immune response. Increased understanding of the important organisms will show whether the current vaccines sold for sheep pneumonia target the correct pathogens. Working together, the researchers and farmers will develop their understanding of respiratory disease in sheep. This partnership will allow co-development of practical, user-friendly interventions, leading to potentially rapid improvement for the health of sheep and lambs. This information will be shared with the wider sheep farming and veterinary community.We envisage this 1-year study as the first step, answering the important questions necessary for immediate improvements and also to enable us to forge ahead with developing more ambitious and innovative approaches for control of lung disease in sheep in the future.