Legislature recognizes value of veterinary medicine in keeping food and farms safe in Commonwealth

[July 23, 2012; Philadelphia, PA] – Governor Tom Corbett has signed the budget bill that approves University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine (Penn Vet) to receive $28 million.

“I am thrilled that Governor Corbett and the state legislature have recognized the impact Penn Vet has on the state’s agriculture industry,” said Joan C. Hendricks, VMD, PhD, the Gilbert S. Kahn Dean of Veterinary Medicine, Penn Vet. “I am thankful, too, for the tremendous support the school has received in recent years from Penn Ag, the Farm Bureau and the Pennsylvania Veterinary Medical Association, as well as from our alumni and Overseers who have advocated on our behalf.”

Penn Vet is the only school of veterinary medicine in the Commonwealth and relies on state funding to provide reduced tuition for Pennsylvanians.

Inherent in Penn Vet’s mission of research, education and service, the school trains veterinarians to protect the health and well being of livestock and diagnose and curb many infectious diseases that are communicable between animal and man, such as Avian/Swine Influenza, West Nile Virus, Lyme disease, Salmonellosis, Listeriosis and e. Coli.

One of the school’s recent breakthroughs includes the development of a detection kit to test for Salmonella in poultry eggs that provides an approximate 10-fold reduction in waiting time for accurate results. This faster turnaround time helps egg producers comply with newer stringent federal requirements and helps ensure public safety while safeguarding an area of the agricultural economy worth in excess of $644 million annually.

This kind of research and development is at the core of Penn Vet’s research mission. The school’s research often transcends the animal world, advancing basic understanding in the areas of cancer, infectious diseases, regenerative medicine and neuroscience and working to apply that new knowledge to design better treatments for diseases of animals and people alike. The school is a global leader in research that links animal science to human welfare, advances food safety, and provides vital defense from bioterrorism and global pandemics.