On-farm mortality in cattle : analysis of on-farm data for cattle for retrospective and prospective epidemiological surveillance

The present study was aimed at exploring if and on what extent on-farm mortality, which is regularly notified in national cattle databases in the EU, could be used to design an early warning system for emerging diseases in cattle. The statistical analysis of mortality rates recorded in Italy in 2008 showed a clear influence by transport, age, sex and season. Through spatial and spatio-clustering methods several geographic area with exceptionally high mortality rates were detected. A more in-dept analysis of individual causes of mortality in the provinces of Trento and Bolzano showed that on-farm mortality was greatly influenced by management practices and economic conditions. In order to control some of the influencing management factors a model was created to compare for a given population the actual and expected mortality rates. A conclusion of the study was that on-farm mortality regularly notified in national livestock databases could represent an important indicator for evaluating herd management and animal welfare practices. Further analysis and refinement of the applied models would be needed in order to establish a robust method for the detection of anomalous events with respect to the outbreak of animal diseases.