Trichinella are small parasites that can infect swine and wild animals, and trichinosis can be transferred to humans by consuming infected meat that is undercooked.
Canadians still get the disease when they eat bear, wild boar and meat from other wild animals, but trichinosis from hogs is extremely rare in Canada.
The last known case was in 2013 on a Mennonite farm in Ontario. The pig was raised in an old-fashioned barn on a non-commercial farm, and the family prepared the meat in a homemade smokehouse. Smoking doesn’t heat the pork to a sufficiently high temperature to kill the trichinella larvae. A child ate the pork and became sick.
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Before that, the last case of trichinosis caused by pork was in 1980.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency continues to monitor Canada’s swine herd for trichinella using two ongoing surveillance programs. In one, about 18,000 slaughtered hogs are tested annually, and in the other, 16,000 sows are tested for trichinella every three to five years.
“This is done to ensure that there has been no introduction of disease to the domestic swine population and to demonstrate to importing countries that Canada’s commercial swine herd is trichinella-free,” the CFIA says.
Those protocols are good enough for Japan, China, the United States and other countries that buy Canadian pork, but Europe wants Canada to go further.
Every shipment of fresh pork from Canada destined for Europe must be tested for trichinella.
“(Or) be submitted to cold treatment by using a treatment approved by the CFIA,” the CFIA says on its website..
That increases the cost and discourages exporters from selling to Europe.
