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Zimbabwe: Boost for Poultry Breeders
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 Published by the government of Zimbabwe |
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The Herald (Harare)
9 July 2008
Posted to the web 9 July 2008
Harare
THE Central Veterinary Laboratory Depart-ment has completed preparing 25 million doses of Newcastle vaccine to be used in the second phase of the Newcastle disease immunisation programme.
In an interview yesterday, Veterinary Field Services Director, Dr Unesu Ushewokunze-Obatolu expressed optimism that by the end of this second phase, more farmers will be in a position to obtain vaccine from Government Animal Management and Health Centres, district or provincial veterinary centres. She said although Newcastle immunisation was ongoing, the programme had been suspended six months ago owing to the unavailability of vaccines. "The immunisation programme had stopped in most areas around the country because there were no vaccines.However, areas that had vaccines continued vaccinating," Dr Ushewokunze-Obatolu said.
Government, she said, was only a provider of expertise and intelligence for prevention of the spread of the disease, while farmers were the first providers of animal health care. She said the outbreak of Newcastle was usually intense in rural areas because birds were not normally vaccinated against the disease unlike in urban areas while breeders vaccinate them. Dr Ushewokunze-Obatolu said each province had an immunisation programme for Newcastle among other diseases. The country suffered outbreaks of Newcastle in 2001 and 2004, which intensified in 2005 and prompted the Veterinary Services Department to embark on a mass immunisation programme. In the late 1990s, Government veterinary researchers adapted a weak strain of the Newcastle disease virus called the I2 obtained from Australia, for local production as a vaccine for direct use by farmers.
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