Elena Repina: Over the past 10 years, milk producers in Russia have not received 3.5 billion rubles because of cattle leukemia

The event was held within the framework of the Flagship educational program for agricultural holdings of Russia "Animal Husbandry of the Future", organized by MSD Animal Health together with the Center for Health Development of the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO and the journal "Agroinvestor".

‘In the period fr om 2000 to 2020, 857,236 cattle were slaughtered in Russia,’ the speaker said. ‘The damage from the shortage of milk amounted to 3.5 billion rubles from 2010 to 2020. Official reports indicate the impossibility of an objective assessment of the situation of cattle leukemia; only from 54% to 62% of the registered livestock is checked. This is the official statistics. Moreover, the reports of different departments differ greatly - up to two times.

Meanwhile, according to the speaker, scientists of the world have proved that the virus of leukemia of cattle when ingested in the human body in 70% of cases can provoke oncological processes. Especially a lot of research on this topic has been conducted in the USA, wh ere a leukemia control program has been operating since 1994.

‘Leukemia spreads when buying livestock from a dysfunctional farm, at the same time, buyers respond that they do not purchase RID-positive animals,’ the expert stated. ‘In Russia, it is necessary to have Enzyme immunoassay and PCR diagnostic methods, which detect a reaction to the genome, as well as the genome of the pathogen. I ask you to pay great attention to the problem of leukemia. We have introduced new rules according to which infected animals must be kept in the reservation until the end of economic use.

As the speaker explained, she has been dealing with the problem of cattle leukemia for six years and, thanks to the efforts of specialists, an examination, PCR, "which becomes a diagnostic test," was introduced into the rules for combating leukemia. The Rosselkhoznadzor, Elena Repina added, "will form appropriate methodological recommendations."

‘Among the ways to solve the problem with cattle leukemia, I call financing research, availability of laboratory diagnostics, because it is very expensive and beyond the means of agricultural producers. In addition, explanatory measures and training of specialists are needed,’ concluded the expert of the Dairy Union of Russia.