Collserola Park will be completely closed to the public until the more than 500 wild boars living there are killed. This is the objective set by the Department of Agriculture, which has already entrusted the Rural Agents Corps with the task of controlling and capturing the animals. The department, headed by Òscar Ordeig, has confirmed that the official resolution will be published this afternoon, but the Catalan government has already begun implementing the "immediate" and "total" closure of the park. Access to the Collserola mountain range was already restricted in many areas, and now the fences and controls will also be extended to the entrances from Barcelona. This comes after the minister himself admitted yesterday that a new case of African swine fever (ASF) had been detected in a wild boar in this area, within the city limits of Barcelona.

African swine fever (ASF) has reached Barcelona. A new positive case of a wild boar infected with the virus has been detected within the Barcelona municipality, as reported this afternoon by the Catalan Minister of Agriculture, Òscar Ordeig, who indicated that this new case will appear in tomorrow's official count by the Ministry of Agriculture. This latest positive result has prompted heightened precautions in the Collserola mountain range, where the closure of the natural park has been reinforced, as reported earlier today by the online newspaper. NationOrdeig explained that a resolution will be issued tomorrow to extend access restrictions to the natural environment, specifically expanding them to the entire Collserola Natural Park. "We are continuing with the containment strategy for the epicenter and the entire Collserola area; as you know, closing the entire natural park is impossible," the minister admitted, "but we are implementing a containment strategy and also reinforcing our resources with captures," he continued. The minister detailed that they met this morning with the municipalities affected by the natural park's entry into the highest-risk zone, as well as with the park's consortium, and that the resolution will be made public tomorrow, Thursday. The Minister of Agriculture again asked for patience and insisted that "the solution will not be short-term under any circumstances." Ordeig explained that containing the virus in this area is easier because it borders the Mediterranean Sea on one side, but, conversely, "there is a difficulty" because it is all happening in a densely populated urban area full of businesses, making perimeter closures difficult.

"The available data indicate that the outbreak began between September and October, not later." This is one of the first conclusions drawn by IRTA-CReSA—the leading animal health institution in Catalonia—regarding the origin of the African swine fever (ASF) outbreak in Catalonia. IRTA, which is also one of Europe's most established research centers on ASF, raises the possibility that the ASF outbreak began one or two months before the first case of African swine fever was detected in Bellaterra at the end of November. IRTA-CReSA explains this in a statement, asserting that the center "is pleased that it has been confirmed that it is not the origin of the African swine fever outbreak." "Scientific evidence confirms this," they emphasize in the document, where they recall that the initial state report, made public last week, shows how "the genetic sequencing of the pathogen that infected the animals found dead in the wild has been compared with the DNA of the strains used in the IRTA biosafety facilities." Furthermore, IRTA announces that "in the coming weeks" it will launch a study on the degree of virulence, behavior, and transmissibility of the virus causing the outbreak. In this regard, they detail that up to this week, more than a thousand samples have been analyzed, of which 155 have tested positive for African swine fever (ASF), and eighteen tons of meat related to the outbreak have been incinerated—the same amount that is usually incinerated in nine months. Moreover, the researchers are also working on the analysis and processing of the data, which is shared daily with the Department of Agriculture. It is in this part of the investigation where they have They found that "the available data" indicate that the outbreak began between September and October 2025. Regarding its origin, IRTA insists that "everything points to the investigations having to refocus on the introduction of contaminated food into the country." In other words, the famous sandwich theory.

The government has detected two new cases of African swine fever (ASF) outside the initial area affected by Bellaterra. This is the first time. since the outbreak was detected in November Two new cases of African swine fever (ASF) have been detected outside the initial "ground zero" (the 6 km radius around the point where the first positive case was found). These two cases were detected in a residential area of ​​Molins de Rei, 2 km from the boundary of the area previously considered high-risk. Given this new situation, the Catalan government has decided to expand the high-risk zone to include Molins de Rei and El Papiol. This was announced on Friday in Lleida by Minister Òscar Ordeig, who specified that there are "no farms affected" within the new radius. Beyond the two cases registered outside the initial radius, eleven new positive cases have also been detected within it, bringing the total number of wild boars with the virus to 155. To date, twelve municipalities were within the high-risk zone, and now Molins de Rei and El Papiol have been added, where access to the natural environment will be restricted starting this Friday. Ordeig announced that the containment measures will be reinforced with new closures on the N-2 and B-23 highways, and that raids will continue in the low-risk zone (the 20 km radius from ground zero).

The sandwich theory – the possibility that the outbreak of African swine fever (ASF) originated from contaminated food – is gaining traction again. This Monday, the Ministry of Agriculture released the initial report from the scientific committee commissioned by the Spanish government to analyze the origin of the ASF outbreak in Bellaterra. Despite being a preliminary document, the experts rule out sabotage, natural transmission, or an accidental laboratory leak as the cause of the crisis. Instead, they consider the sandwich theory to be "coherent" and "compatible" with explaining the origin of the ASF outbreak.

The Catalan pig farming sector has accumulated losses of approximately €63 million so far due to the outbreak of African swine fever (ASF) detected in Vallès Occidental, according to calculations presented this Tuesday by the farmers' union Unió de Pagesos. Specifically, Catalan farmers have gone from earning approximately €20 per pig on average in 2025 to losing €36 per animal following the detection of the disease in Catalonia. These losses are due to the drop in pork prices and, above all, the loss of foreign markets outside the European Union, since pork is the country's main export industry within the agri-food sector. Furthermore, more than 61,000 head of cattle were quarantined in the province of Barcelona. European, Spanish, and international protocols against the spread of the ASF virus They limit the sale of meat abroad And they stipulate that the entire country will be considered affected by the epidemic until 12 months have passed without any new cases being detected. The fact that the sector has begun operating at a loss is causing concern among farmers. "What we can't do is produce at a loss for an extended period," said Rossend Saltiveri, head of the pig farming sector at Unió de Pagesos, at a press conference in Lleida.

The theory that the African swine fever (ASF) outbreak in Collserola could have originated from the IRTA-CReSA laboratory is losing steam every day. This Tuesday, the Catalan government announced that the analysis it commissioned from the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB) found no match between the virus strain that infected the first wild boars and the various samples of the pathogen being worked with at the Catalan laboratory. Specifically, the IRB sequenced 17 ASF virus samples that IRTA-CReSA has worked with in recent years and concluded that none of them matched the sequencing performed by the European reference laboratory on the virus strain samples taken from the first two cases. "We have found no match to indicate that the virus from the outbreak corresponds to the laboratory samples," explained ICREA research professor Toni Gabaldón, jointly affiliated with the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB) and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC), and director of the Comparative Genomics group. The IRB explained that the differences observed between the samples "are too significant" to establish any direct link between the outbreak and the laboratory located in Bellaterra. The experts detailed that "the virus detected in Cerdanyola del Vallès presents dozens of specific mutations and a large genomic deletion [i.e., a loss of genetic material] that do not appear in any of the laboratory strains analyzed."

The Central Veterinary Laboratory in Algete (Madrid) has confirmed that 10 more wild boars have tested positive for African swine fever (ASF). All of them were found in the vicinity of Collserola Park, within the municipality of Cerdanyola del Vallès, as were all the other specimens in which the presence of the pathogen has been confirmed. Including these 10 confirmed cases from Tuesday, the total number of wild boars that have died from ASF in the highest-risk area is now 26. The other 208 carcasses analyzed tested negative for ASF, according to a statement from the Ministry of Agriculture. The Catalan Minister of Agriculture, Òscar Ordeig, stated that the detection of these 10 new positive cases "is within the realm of normality," given that the search for wild boars in the virus-affected area has been intensified in recent days. "It's normal for them to keep appearing; ideally, they should be contained," he said after explaining that all the cases were found within the same 6-kilometer radius. "This was already expected. In fact, the real news would be if no more cases appeared," Ordeig said at a press conference from the Palau de la Generalitat, where he ruled out increasing restrictions on access to the natural environment as a result of these new cases.

José Ángel Barasona is a Ramón y Cajal researcher at the Veterinary Health Surveillance Center (VISAVET) of the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM). He has been researching African swine fever (ASF) in wild boar for 10 years and is now working with wild boar infected with ASF.

It's not even eight in the morning and everyone's already there. They've had breakfast, but they're making coffee to warm up and finish getting organized. The younger ones are with the dog handlers, devising the strategy for the hunt. Inside their headquarters, a small space with walls covered in the heads of wild boar and roe deer, the older members are gathered in front of the fireplace. They also participate in the hunt organized by the El Pi de Berga Wild Boar Association, but they're veterans and observe it with a certain detachment.

The Catalan government is finalizing the perimeter closure this Thursday, using "fences and other physical barriers," of a 6-kilometer radius in the Collserola area where African swine fever (ASF) was detected. This measure aims to intensify the capture and culling of wild boar, as explained by the Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Aquaculture. The Minister indicated that the actions will be carried out within a radius of 4 to 6 kilometers to "create a safety zone free of animals that could spread the virus to either side." This area, now closed off with physical barriers, is the closest to the origin of the ASF outbreak, which is where the first two dead wild boars infected with the virus were found. Following European, national, and Catalan health regulations regarding outbreaks of African swine fever, the Catalan government has declared two different zones affected by the epidemic: the first encompasses municipalities within a 6-kilometer radius of the initial outbreak, considered a "high-risk zone"—where physical barriers will now be erected—and the second, a "low-risk zone" extending 20 kilometers from the outbreak's origin. Currently, movement restrictions not only affect the main outbreak area within the 6-kilometer radius but also extend to a total of 91 towns in the Barcelona metropolitan area within a 20-kilometer radius of the initial outbreak, as well as nearby natural parks. The Department of Agriculture has restricted access to natural areas until December 14, but depending on how the epidemic evolves, this period could be extended starting next Monday.

The Animal Health Research Center (IRTA-CReSA) denies that the construction work being carried out at its facilities could have affected the biosafety of its laboratories. This is the first statement issued by IRTA, which ARA has been able to access, since the Ministry of Agriculture announced on Friday that is investigating whether the African swine fever (ASF) outbreak originated in a laboratory

The Catalan Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries, and Food, Òscar Ordeig, stated this Wednesday that the Catalan government intends to halve the wild boar population in Catalonia. To this end, Ordeig announced the creation of the Catalan Wild Boar Roundtable, an organization that will bring together public administrations, hunting associations, and scientists specializing in game wildlife with the aim of more closely monitoring the number of these mammals and their distribution across the region. The overpopulation of wild boar in Catalonia has returned to the public debate following the discovery of 15 dead specimens infected with the African swine fever (ASF) virus. Despite the cases of infected wild boar, Ordeig reiterated that, for the moment, no positive cases have been detected in domestic pigs on the 55 livestock farms located in the 91 municipalities within the area considered affected by ASF. "For the moment, the virus has not entered any farms or any commercial circuit," he declared. "What is our objective? To reduce the wild boar population in Catalonia by 50% in the coming years," Ordeig explained before appearing before the Parliament's Agriculture Committee, where he outlined the Catalan government's actions to curb the outbreak of African swine fever to the parliamentary groups. The minister estimated the number of wild boar in Catalonia at 125,000 "in winter"—that is, before the breeding season—which could reach around 180,000 at peak population. To achieve this objective, Ordeig announced the creation of the Catalan Wild Boar Roundtable, a "governance body" that will include representatives from various public administrations, game scientists, the primary sector, and hunting associations, among others. This committee will be responsible for controlling the wild boar population throughout Catalonia.

The Catalan Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries, and Food, Òscar Ordeig, defended on Tuesday the "full independence" and "absolute autonomy" of the group of experts investigating the origin of the African swine fever (ASF) outbreak in Collserola. This committee, created by the Catalan government, must clarify whether the virus arrived from another country—for example, through contaminated meat or other biological remains of infected pigs—or whether, as currently seems more likely, it originated in a laboratory, possibly the Animal Health Research Center (Cresa-Irs), or in wild boars that died from the virus. "No one has more desire, incentive, and willingness to clarify" the origin of the outbreak than the Catalan government, Ordeig said at a press conference. According to the regional minister, the members of the committee, appointed this Sunday, are "recognized experts from other institutions" outside of Cresa and, therefore, have full capacity to freely investigate the origin of the epidemic. "We are letting the scientists do their work," he reiterated.

Several countries have already accepted the import of pork and pork products produced in Catalonia and throughout Spain, with the exception of products from companies located within the 20-kilometer radius considered the area affected by African swine fever (ASF), as explained this Thursday by the Catalan Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries, and Food. Specifically, countries such as the United Kingdom, Chile, and the Philippines have agreed to import Spanish pork from outside this perimeter, while China—the main market outside the European Union—accepts meat from all over Spain except for the province of Barcelona. The ban on exports to countries outside the European Union initially affected all farms in Catalonia and throughout Spain, without exception, when the epidemic was declared in Spain last week. Following the declaration, the Ministry of Agriculture has had to negotiate the regionalization of export bans on a country-by-country basis so that farms not located in areas affected by African swine fever can continue exporting.

The Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food announced on Tuesday that the number of wild boars infected with African swine fever (ASF) has risen to nine, according to a statement. Until now, only two carcasses found in Cerdanyola del Vallès had tested positive for the disease, but seven more suspected cases have now also tested positive, according to analyses conducted by the National Reference Laboratory in Algete (Madrid), which is part of the ministry. According to the ministry's statement, the carcasses of the seven newly infected wild boars were found "very close to where the other two appeared last week," in the Collserola area. The new figure has been reported to the European Commission and the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH). However, the Spanish government maintains that no cases have been detected in domestic pigs or on pig farms.

The Catalan pharmaceutical company Hipra will begin animal trials next year of the prototype vaccines it has developed against African swine fever (ASF), although the treatment will not be available to eradicate the current outbreak of the virus detected in Catalonia. The company has been researching the virus since 2019 and has been leading a European project to develop an ASF vaccine for the past two years. Marta Sitjà, research director of Hipra's animal health division, admits that this virus, in addition to its virulence, is also "very complex" because it has up to 150 proteins, and blocking just one is not enough to prevent it from continuing to infect pigs. However, Hipra cannot yet give a date for when the ASF vaccine will reach the market. "We are still far from that," says Sitjà, who emphasizes that in the face of the current crisis, measures must be taken to eradicate the virus.