Biocontainment, biosecurity, and security practices in beef feedyards.

Objective: To determine the biocontainment, biosecurity, and security practices at beef feedyards in the Central Plains of the United States.

Design: Survey.

Sample Population: Managers of feedyards in Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Texas that feed beef cattle for finish before slaughter; feedyards had to have an active concentrated animal feeding operation permit with a 1-time capacity of >or= 1,000 cattle.

Detecting emerging diseases in farm animals through clinical observations.

Predicting emerging diseases is among the most difficult challenges facing researchers and health managers. We present available approaches and tools to detect emerging diseases in animals based on clinical observations of farm animals by veterinarians. Three information systems are described and discussed: Veterinary Practitioner Aided Disease Surveillance in New Zealand, the Rapid Syndrome Validation Project-Animal in the United States, and "émergences" in France.