Mulberry Heart Disease of Swine
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Abstract
The term "Mulberry Heart Disease" is applied to a condition of unknown etiology affecting swine. The disease is encountered most frequently in pigs in good physical condition being fattened for market. In Ontario it has been found in animals as young as four weeks of age and in animals as old as four years of age, but it occurs most often in the eight to twenty weeks of age group. The condition has been described as Mulberry Heart Disease by Lamont et al. (22) in Ireland, Tutt and Gale (42), Vogt (43), and Wood (44) in England. Bennett (2, 3) in the U. S. A. has described the lesions of Mulberry Heart Disease as a variation of Edema Disease of swine. Mulberry Heart Disease is one of the major causes of losses in pigs of post-weaning age which are being fed for market. Of even more concern is our inability to make any satisfactory recommendations for the pre- vention of future outbreaks. Because of this, studies were undertaken to define the condition as it exists in Ontario with regard to specific lesions, epidemiology and bacteriology. Investigations were carried out in an attempt to determine the cause.