Mozambique: Cattle will be vaccinated to stop anthrax spread

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Mozambique: Cattle will be vaccinated to stop anthrax spread

7:09 CAT | 14 Mar 2024

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: Notícias]

Mozambique’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development(MADER) announced on Tuesday a vaccination campaign for cattle between April and July to stop the spread of anthrax, a disease detected in the centre of the country.

“We are going to start vaccination throughout the country,” which will take place “from April to July,” said the national director of Livestock Development at MADER, Américo da Conceição, speaking to journalists in Maputo on the sidelines of an event organised by the institution.

Conceição said that the immunisation aims to combat anthrax, a disease caused by a bacterium and detected in the district of Vandúzi, Manica province, in the country’s centre.

“Anthrax is a zoonotic disease and the consumption of meat from animals with this disease is not allowed, it is not advisable,” said the national director of Livestock Development.

Américo da Conceição explained that the bacteria that causes this disease occurs because of the drought and is found in the soil. It infects animals when they feed “close to the ground.”

The vaccination campaign that will start in April, he continued, also aims to immunise against symptomatic anthrax and other diseases that affect cattle.

In relation to the outbreak of anthrax detected in the district of Vandúzi, the National Directorate for Livestock Development issued a notice on 1 April banning the movement of cattle, meat and their by-products from the province of Manica, imposing a quarantine on affected livestock farms and emergency vaccination.

The notice, consulted by Lusa, calls for intensified surveillance throughout the country, grazing and watering cattle in places with abundant water and reinforced surveillance against clandestine slaughter and the sale of uninspected meat.

Source: Lusa