Swine fever sweeps Italy's north, threatening production of prized prosciutto and livelihoods

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One of Giovanni Airoli’s sows tested positive for African swine fever in late August

CORTELEONA E GENZONE, Italy — One of Giovanni Airoli’s sows tested positive for African swine fever in late August. Within a week, all 6,200 sows, piglets and fattening pigs on his farm south of Milan were slaughtered under strict protocols to halt the disease threatening Italy’s 20 billion euro prosciutto, cured sausage and pork industry.

Since swine fever appeared on the peninsula in January 2022, Italy has killed nearly 120,000 pigs — three-quarters of those over the past two months alone as the emergency intensified.

“It’s a desolation," Airoli said outside his farm in the northern Lombardy region that is ground zero for Italy’s swine fever epidemic. No one is allowed in and out except for employees, and then under strict hygiene protocols that require clean coveralls and boots for use only inside the premises.

“It happened to us despite applying all of the safety measures required. There was obviously a failure. We don’t understand what it could have been," Airoli said.

The disease spiked with 24 outbreaks in early September, most of them in Lombardy. The area of greatest concern, where the dissease has been confirmed in domestic pigs, extends 4,500 square kilometers (nearly 1,740 square miles) and includes neighboring Piedmont and Emilia Romagna, a region world renowned for its prized Parma prosciutto.

The impact of the swine fever outbreak goes further. Farmers in the 23,000-square kilometer (8,880-square mile) area also face restrictions due to infected wild boars, or because they fall in a buffer zone.

The disease, which is nearly always fatal to swine, first infected wild boars and quickly spread to domestic pigs, which