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Nathan Foster

I hope someone comes forwards with first hand experience to help you. There is a big difference between "pigs can carry" versus "pigs do carry x disease in Australia". many times domestic cattle are the culprits of disease carrying. feral animals tend to get the blame.


All of the diseases I have seen listed for pigs in Australia can be killed by freezing meat, then cooking it. Slow and long is the rule for cooking pork anyway. However, there is a risk when handling game prior to cooking.

Lets look at what has been said about Australian pigs in the potential disease department:

Lepto
Brucellosis
Murray Valley Encephalitis

Parasites and parasite born bacterial infections.

Other potential diseases not commonly mentioned include:
Hydatids
TB

Cattle can be equally effected by these diseases and most of these diseases can be found in many countries of the world. If you really wanted to play it safe- you would never leave home and never eat any wild game meat!

I think the first thing to understand is that generally speaking, a healthy carcass is a healthy carcass. Body condition (weight) should be observed, the tail checked for diarrhea etc. Internal organs should be uniform in color and appearance.

lepto can be seen as white spots on the liver. You can research the other potential diseases on the list below and make yourself a laminated flash card to identify symptoms.

According to Australian health research, MVE can only be transferred to humans via mosquito bites. You will need to research this more to be sure.

Old Brucy shows as lesions on the body and kidney. you can use Google (images) key words: Brucellosis lesions swine.

In conclusion:
1. Hopefully someone replies to your thread that can verify the frequency of diseases in Australian feral pigs.
2. You research potential diseases for yourself and perhaps create a flash card / check list.

OK, I hope that gives you some direction, even if nobody else comes forwards.