Hi all
First, sorry for what may be an excess of posts. It's just that this topic has been important to me since I started beekeeping in 1974. Back then beekeepers were using sulfathiazole to treat AFB, often surreptitiously. Then came terramycin and pretty soon it was in hives 24/7. From 2006 to 2008, I worked for New York State and participated in the destruction of hundreds of hives, some with only a few cells of AFB. In Pennsylvania, it was allowed to treat "mild cases;" in NY it was not. I am going to pass on some excerpts from the "USDA APHIS National Honey Bee Pests and Diseases Survey Project Plan for 2024"—
Since 2009, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has funded an annual national survey of honey bee pests and diseases. Since its inception, the Survey has been the most comprehensive honey bee pest and health survey in the U.S. The survey provides the incidence and distribution of known diseases and parasite loads.
The samples preserved in alcohol will be inspected using visual and microscopic analysis at UMD for the following: Tropilaelaps spp. presence or absence; A. cerana presence or absence; Varroa spp. loads; Nosema spp. spore count.
Live bees taken from each apiary … will be frozen at -80°C until molecular and visual analyses are conducted. The molecular analyses will include the following: Acute bee paralysis virus (ABPV); Chronic bee paralysis virus (CBPV); etc.
The survey includes a visual inspection of the hives before sampling. The presence of the following is recorded at the apiaries and entered into the database, but not included in analysis. Visual identification of these diseases and pests is dependent on the training and experience of the sampling personnel: American Foul Brood; European Foul Brood; etc.
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As you can see, foul brood is very low on the list of things they are looking for. In fact, they seem to be acknowledging that some personnel may not have "the training and experience" to detect these. If they are detected, there is no indication as to what is done, other than jotting it down in a notebook but they are "not included in analysis."
Now, if in fact AFB, EFB, etc. are no longer considered a problem, that's fine I suppose. But there are still laws on the books mandating destruction of AFB where found. None of the other things is considered so actionable, with the exception of Tropilaelaps and A. cerana, although they don't say so. I think the likelihood of A. cerana arriving at our shores is slim to none, but everyone is worried about Trops.
PLB
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