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International Society for Infectious Diseases
Date: Tue 16 Mar 2010
Source: Daily Mirror, Sri Lanka [edited]
Cattle farmers and government authorities are baffled about the
deaths of over 3000 milking cattle in the Ampara district in the past
few days, which have caused a great loss to the livelihood of cattle
breeders in the area.
The Thirukkovil Government Veterinary Surgeon said yesterday [15 Mar
2010] that nearly 3000 milking cattle had died in Thangavillai,
Ampara as a result of progressive emaciation due to close herding of
cattle as well as prevailing weather conditions.
"The deaths started occurring less than 2 weeks ago. We immediately
began our research in collaboration with the Polonnaruwa Veterinary
Research Officer to find out whether it was an epidemic," said
Thirukkovil Government Veterinary Surgeon Dr. Mrs. Thambamalar Gohulathash.
They had collected blood and foetal samples of the animals for check-ups.
"We have been able to come to the conclusion that the deaths were due
to the close herding of the animals," she added.
According to Dr. Gohulathash, farmers, although they had been advised
to do otherwise, have been herding the cattle in small land plots.
"Even though the number of animals was increasing, the farmers kept
on herding them in the same location," she said, pointing out that
this was not favourable for the health conditions of animals.
She also said acute contamination of water, neglecting the de-worming
process and the rapid environmental changes due to the heavy rains
and sudden drought that followed subsequently were other reasons
behind the deaths of cattle.
Meanwhile, South Dairy Development Co-operative Society dairy farmers
claim that more than 10 000 of their milking cattle have died and
that the deaths are the result of a disease to which the Animal
Production Department had no medication.
[Byline: Lakna Paranamanna and K.N. Tharmalingam]
--
Communicated by:
ProMED-mail
[For a map of Sri Lanka and the Ampara district, see map at
The attribution of this striking mass mortality, within less than 2
weeks, in (adult?) bovines to "progressive emaciation due to close
herding and prevailing weather conditions" needs to be substantiated.
The mentioning of "collection of foetal samples" may be indicative of
abortions. Is this correct? In order to be able to assess the
possible background to this grave event, there is need for data on
the number of farms involved, the age distribution and pregnancy
stages of the affected animals, possible common sources of their
feed, clinical investigations of their cohorts, findings of autopsies
and laboratory investigations, which should cover possible
infectious, parasitological, metabolic and toxicological factors. - Mod.AS]
...........................................sb/arn/msp/dk
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