Mycoplasma bovis is an etiologic agent of pneumonia, arthritis, and otitis in young calves, such as those found in the special-fed veal industry. We conducted a blinded, controlled trial of two ...commercially available M. bovis bacterin vaccines for the prevention of respiratory disease in calves associated with M. bovis infection. Calves were randomly assigned to a subcutaneous treatment of vaccine A (n=50), adjuvant A (n=50), vaccine B (n=50), or 0.9% sterile saline solution (n=50) beginning at 27 days of age. Upper-respiratory tract colonization was not impacted by vaccination status. Vaccine A significantly reduced the presence of lung lesions (p=0.0325), however there was no significant reduction of M. bovis in lung lesions. Vaccine B did not significantly reduce total lung lesions or M. bovis-specific lung lesions. The relative risk was determined to be 0.56, 1.0, and 1.36 for vaccine A, adjuvant A, and vaccine B, respectively. There was no association between the total specific antibody isotype (IgM, IgG1, IgG2, IgA) concentrations or M. bovis antibodies and the M. bovis-associated morbidity in the veal calves. Under the field conditions of this study, observed vaccine efficacy for vaccine A and vaccine B was 44% and less than 1%, respectively.
The study reported here assessed the farm safety and health training needs of beginning farmers in Pennsylvania to help educators develop training workshops and materials to meet those needs. Results ...of the online survey indicate that participants highly value farm safety, consider themselves to have mostly minimal to moderate skills relative to the safe operation of farms, and are willing to attend safety training workshops. The results of the study provide direction to Extension educators in designing farm safety and health training for this growing constituent group.
