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National officials probing the recent ASF outbreak in Catalonia are now considering the chance that the disease could have escaped from a scientific laboratory. Their focus has narrowed to several nearby facilities as possible sources.

Outbreak Details and Industry Stakes

A total of thirteen infections of the fever have been confirmed in feral pigs in the rural areas outside the Catalan capital since 28 November. This has led Spain – the European Union's biggest pork exporter – to scramble to control the outbreak before it escalates into a significant risk to the country's multi-billion euro pork export industry.

Shifting Theories of Origin

At first, local authorities suspected the outbreak started after a boar consumed infected food brought in from abroad – perhaps a discarded food item from a truck driver.

However, the national ministry of agriculture has initiated a different investigation after concluding that the variant of the pathogen detected in the dead animals in Catalonia is not the same as the one reported to be present in other European countries. According to a report suggest the strain in question is rather akin to one detected in the country of Georgia in the year 2007.

"The discovery of a virus like the one that circulated in Georgia does not, therefore, rule out the possibility that its origin is a biological containment laboratory," stated the agriculture department.

Research Link Explored

The 'Georgia-2007' viral strain is a 'reference' virus commonly used in experimental infections in secure labs to study the disease or to evaluate the efficacy of treatments, which are currently under development. The report suggests that the virus might not have originated in animals or animal products from any of the countries where the disease is currently active.

Official Actions and Audit

In reaction, Salvador Illa stated he had instructed the regional research body to carry out an inspection of five facilities that handle the ASF pathogen within a 20km radius of the outbreak site.

"We are not excluding any possibilities when it comes to the source of the outbreak of African swine fever, but neither is it confirming any," he said. "Every theory remain open. Above all, we need to know what happened."

Latest Control Measures

The agriculture ministry have reported 13 cases of the virus – all of them in deceased wild boar found within 6km of the initial focus. They have said the corpses of an additional 37 wild animals discovered in the area have been analysed, with every one showing no infection for the virus. Specialists dispatched to the 39 pig farms within the 20km radius have detected no trace of the illness on those farms. More than 100 personnel from the country's military emergencies unit have also been deployed to the area to work alongside police officers and wildlife rangers.

Worldwide Context of ASF

Long native to the African continent, African swine fever is harmless to people but often fatal to pigs. In the year 2018, the disease turned up in China, which is has about 50% of the global pig population. By the following year, there were concerns that as many as one hundred million pigs had been lost. Two years later, the virus was confirmed to be in Germany, a country with one of the European Union's largest swine herds.

The Country's Pivotal Role in Pork Exports

The nation, which is the EU’s largest pork producer, sold pig meat products worth €5.1bn to other EU countries in the previous year, and nearly 3.7 billion euros of pig-based goods to markets outside Europe. National data show that Spain processed 58 million pigs in the year 2021 – an rise of 40% from a decade earlier.