In March 2003, classical swine fever (CSF) infection was reported in a piggery located at Iksan city, Jeollabuk-do in Korea. Subsequently, a total of 72 infected farms were confirmed between March and December, 2003. Based on epidemiological investigation of the earlier confirmed infected farms, the source of infection was shown to be from a breeding farm. Targeted surveillance of 82 piggeries that had acquired pigs from this breeding farm showed 44 piggeries were infected with CSF virus.

This paper described the epidemiological characteristics of 2002 outbreak of classical swine fever (CSF) in Korea. A total of thirteen CSF-infected farms could be classified into two clusters according to the location and time of outbreak. Two farms located in the same county of Gangwon province and 11 farms located in several different districts of Incheon metropolitan/Gyeonggi province were identified as CSF-infected from April 16 to 30 and from October 7 to December 21 in December 21 in 2002, respectively.

A total of 10 colostrum-deprived pigs (1 or 2-day-old) and 6 pigs 35-day-old), which had been raised by natural maternal nursing, were used to study the pathogenicity of the porcine enteroviruses by the intracerebral and intramuscular routes of inoculation, which the enterovirus were isolated from the diseased pigs in Korea. The porcine enteroviruses produced an identical polioencephalomyelitis in colostrum-deprived pigs and 35-day-old pigs, which manifested clinical signs and histological changes. Clinically it was characterized by incoordination, rise in rectal temperature, ataxia, flaccid paralysis in all the experimental groups