African swine fever has made significant damage in Brcko District, an administrative unit in Bosnia's north with 6,500 animals euthanised to this date in 194 households.

Kosta Kojic, the Head of the Veterinary Medicine Department of Brcko District, said that this is something that happens once in 100 or 200 years, and that the damage is estimated at millions of marks.

“We were burying animals on the spot,” he said, noting that this was a better option than sreading the virus around by transportation of animals.

The damage will be most visible next year when all reserves are exhausted, according to him.

The neighbouring Semberija region has also been strongly affected by the disease, with even higher mortality rate than in Brcko District.

According to official information so far 32,500 animals have been removed. Sreten Vuckovic of the Agriculture Department Bijeljina warns that the situation is still not under control.

“Every day we receive around 20-25 reports where vets take samples on suspicious and dead swines. We get the results the other day and 95-100% of them are positive. It's devastating,” he said.

Vuckovic deems that the damage at this moment amounts to 10 million marks (approx 5 million euro), but that indirect damage will be four-fold.