The Montana Department of Livestock (MDOL) is encouraging the public to submit comments to remove brucellosis from the USDA’s Select Agents and Toxins list.
Diseases included on the list restrict full research potential because they are deemed as a threat to human, animal, or plant health.
MDOL says that, according to Montana State Veterinarian Dr. Marty Zaluski, including brucellosis on the list has prevented research that could have led to new vaccines, diagnostics, and other methods of disease control.
While the intent of including brucellosis on the Select Agent List was to limit the availability of the bacteria, it’s having the opposite effect,” states Zaluski.
“The disease is becoming more broadly distributed on the landscape and we have few tools to stop it.”
The comment period ends May 18.
Comments may be submitted at www.regulations.gov by searching for document ID CDC-2020-0024-0001, or document ID APHIS-2019-0018-0001.
