African swine fever (ASF), caused by African swine fever virus, is a hemorrhagic and often fatal disease of domestic pigs and wild boar, which is notifiable to the World Organization for Animal Health. On August 3, 2018, China reported the first outbreak of ASF in Shenyang, a northeastern city of China. As of October 8, a total of 33 ASF outbreaks were reported in eight provinces in China, the biggest pork producer and consumer in the world. This commentary summarizes the current situation of ASF in China, measures that China has taken to control the disease, lessons learnt from other countries, challenges and recommendations on ASF control in China, and possible international collaborations on ASF. ASF is an unprecedented disaster and challenge to the Chinese swine industry. It will be a formidable and protracted campaign to control ASF in China, which requires joint participation and coordination of stakeholders and agencies at different levels.

Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) are major microorganisms used for probiotic purposes and prime parts of the human and mammalian gut microbiota, which exert important health-promoting effects on the host. The present study aimed to evaluate and compare the probiotic potential and safety of LAB strains isolated from the gastrointestinal tract of a wild boar from the Greater Khingan Mountains, China. Amongst all of the isolated LAB strains, five isolates identified as Lactobacillus mucosae, Lactobacillus salivarius, Enterococcus hirae, Enterococcus durans, and Enterococcus faecium, were remarkably resistant to acid and bile salt. The probiotic characteristics (including adhesion capability, antimicrobial activities, autoaggregation, and coaggregation abilities), and safety properties (including hemolytic activity, antibiotic resistance, absence/presence of virulence factors, and in vivo safety) were evaluated. The results showed that all five isolates exhibited high adhesive potential, remarkable aggregation capacity, and antibacterial activities. Upon assessment of the safety, these strains were negative for hemolytic activity and all tested virulence genes. In vivo safety assessment showed no adverse effects of isolated strains supplementation on the body weight gain and organ indices of the treated mice. This study revealed that these LAB isolates, especially L. salivarius M2-71, possess desirable probiotic properties and have great potentials for the development of feed additives for animals to promote health.

African swine fever (ASF) is a highly lethal hemorrhagic disease of swine caused by African swine fever virus (ASFV), a unique and genetically complex virus. The disease continues to be a huge burden to the pig industry in Africa, Europe and recently in Asia, especially China. The purpose of this review is to recapitulate the current scenarios and evolving trends in ASF vaccine development. The unavailability of an applicable ASF vaccine is partly due to the complex nature of the virus, which encodes various proteins associated with immune evasion. Moreover, the incomplete understanding of immune protection determinants of ASFV hampers the rational vaccine design. Developing an effective ASF vaccine continues to be a challenging task due to many undefined features of ASFV immunobiology. Recent attempts on DNA and live attenuated ASF vaccines have been reported with promising efficacy, and especially live attenuated vaccines have been proved to provide complete homologous protection. Single‐cycle viral vaccines have been developed for various diseases such as Rift Valley fever, bluetongue and the rational extension of these strategies could be helpful for developing single‐cycle ASF vaccines. Therefore, live attenuated vaccines in short‐term and single‐cycle vaccines in long‐term would be the next‐generation of ASF vaccines.