LAUNCH OF FOOT & MOUTH DISEASE CONTROL PROGRAM.
Chandigarh, 1st November 2017: Foot & Mouth Disease Control Programme of Animals, a Government of India initiative, was formally launched in U.T, Chandigarh by Capt. Karnail Singh, Director Animal Husbandry & Fisheries today at village Dhanas, Chandigarh. A large number of livestock owners and members of nearby Gram Panchayats were present on the occasion. They were educated for economic importance of Foot & Mouth Disease in animals and its prevention.
It is for the first time that Government of India, Department of Animal Husbandry & Dairying and Fisheries, Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare has included Chandigarh, U.T under the FMD-CP from 2017-18.
Foot & Mouth is one of the most economically devastating contagious viral animal diseases affecting all susceptible cloven footed animals and causes great loss in production of susceptible animals. Dr Kanwarjit Singh, Joint Director, Animal Husbandry revealed that under this programme, a mass vaccination drive has been initiated by Animal Husbandry Department to vaccinate all susceptible species of animals against FMD free of cost to ensure 100% coverage of animals. Animals shall be vaccinated twice in a year of which first round shall be carried out during the month of Sept-Oct and 2nd round during Feb-March each year. To keep the record of animals vaccinated, Animal Health cards have been issued to each Livestock owners for their animals. Besides vaccinating the animals, Sero monitoring & Sero surveillance of the disease shall be carried out. The Pre & Post vaccination samples of cow & buffaloes shall be collected and sent to RDDL, Jalandhar for investigation to monitor the implementation of the programme in U.T. Chandigarh .
The Department has covered all the 11 villages of Chandigarh (U.T.) under this campaign. 20,000 animals are to be vaccinated under this programme.