Second Round Of Foot And Mouth Disease Vaccination Program Launched In Chandigarh
The 2nd Round of Foot and Mouth Disease vaccination campaign has been launched under National Animal Disease Control Program (NADCP) by the Department of Animal Husbandry & Fisheries in UT Chandigarh at village Sarangpur, under the guidance of Dr Vijay Namdeorao Zade, Secretary Animal Husbandry. The effort is in the direction of contributing towards doubling farmers’ income. The NADCP is the Central Govt. Scheme for eradication of Foot and Mouth Disease and Brucellosis in livestock. The prevalence of these animal diseases is a serious concern to the growth of livestock farmers.
While launching the Foot and Mouth Vaccination Campaign, Manish Kumar Lohan – Director, Animal Husbandry, said that the overall aim of this program is to control Foot and Mouth Disease by 2025 with scheduled vaccinations and its eventual eradication by 2030. This will increase domestic production and ultimately in increased exports of milk and livestock products. This disease is amongst the most serious diseases of animals in terms of economic impact and is globally recognized as a priority disease for control and eradication.
On occasion, Dr Kanwarjit Bhangoo, Joint Director of Animal Husbandry informed that this vaccination campaign would be completed in one month. This door-to-door vaccination of all large and small animals shall be done free of cost under COVID guidelines. For the purpose of identification and record of vaccinated animals, all the animals in Chandigarh (UT) had been tagged and issued a “Pashu Aadhar” number to livestock farmers. He said that control of FMD can be achieved by mass and repeated vaccination of susceptible livestock at regular intervals till the incidence of disease comes down. This will not only make animals healthy but will also result in better productivity and acceptability of our animals’ products all over the world.
More than 50 livestock farmers from different villages of Chandigarh (UT) participated in the program and appreciated the effort of the department in providing efficient health cover to the livestock population of Chandigarh.
