RUNDU – The agriculture ministry’s directorate of veterinary services (DVS) is currently hard at work to vaccinate cattle against foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) in the entire Kavango East region.
Cases of FMD were recently detected in Ndiyona constituency and the DVS has since took on the battle to contain it.
“The vaccination started on 17 October and it will end during the first week of November. It is being done in all constituencies and farms,” said state veterinarian Dr Thompson Shuro during a field visit yesterday.
“We have 19 teams going around the region, 10 teams came in from the north and five teams from Kavango West and four teams from here. We could not manage with our four teams hence we roped in others from other regions to assist.”
Farmers have been urged to take their cattle at crush pens in their areas for vaccination.
The agriculture ministry on 6 October announced the FMD outbreak at Hoha village in Ndiyona where 13 cattle tested positive for the disease.
At the time, the ministry stated farmers in the affected area reported cattle showing FMD clinical symptoms, (limping, salivation) to officials of DVS and the veterinary officials immediately instituted an outbreak investigation that included clinical inspection of cattle as well as collecting samples for laboratory analysis.
“FMD cases were subsequently confirmed by the central veterinary laboratory in Windhoek on 28 September. Investigations by officials indicated that 13 cattle out of a 657 population of cattle in the crush pen area of Hoha village tested positive for FMD,” agriculture ministry executive director Percy Misika said in a statement earlier this month.
“Those 13 cattle were found in eight kraals out of 23 kraals in that village.”