The generally low prevalence across the country was a result of the high levels of onfarm control by sheep farmers and while encouraging, farmers must remain vigilant.
History had proved that when onfarm control and regular dog treatments reduced the prevalence rapidly increased.
So farmers were to be commended for the low prevalence but urged not to get complacent, Lynch said.
The recorded data had been affected this season with the occurrence of several high-prevalence storm lines.
Those lines, while affecting just a small number of farms, resulted in a significant number of lambs being infected.
Storm infections arose when sheep measles naive lambs were exposed to pasture contaminated by an infected dog.
That resulted in high levels of infection with accompanying condemnations at processing.
“While not common, a number of these have occurred in the past 12 months, resulting in significant losses to farmers with two separate operations losing over $30,000 each as a result,” Lynch said.
The North Island consistently had a higher prevalence than the South Island with factors such as a higher human population accompanied by an increased dog population contributing to the North’s sheep measles prevalence.
Farm geography, where dead stock were more difficult to retrieve or even detect, also led to greater risk of dogs getting infected.
While the sheep measles prevalence was at low levels Ovis was exploring options to build on the opportunity to take the levels even lower.
To achieve that, maintaining and where necessary increasing onfarm control measures were important, Lynch said.
