The Importance Of Disease Control In Developing Nations
The lack of means to control the occurrence of new cases has led to the self-perpetuation of this outbreak in Arua over more than a year. Whilst in countries such as Australia and Canada, the process of disease control is greatly assisted by the accessibility of vaccines, which are one of the most effective means of anthrax control, outbreak control in developing nations such as Uganda is evidently more difficult.
As suggested in the article, the expense of the vaccine has led to considerable resistance against its implementation. Thus, until the community is able to be convinced of the greater long-term socio-economic costs of continued anthrax-related deaths, or to cost is subsidized by the government or an external organisation, this unlikely to be a feasible option. The continued slaughtering, handling and consumption of diseased animals is one of the most pertinent issues, since farming determines livelihoods and the cease of animal production represents socioeconomic losses. As such, raising community awareness around the zoonotic consequences of anthrax, requiring increased surveillance and modified animal management practices, is likely to the be the most practical option (FAO, 2016). Farmers should be educated on the importance of implementing simple biosecurity measures, such as reporting suspicious sudden deaths, using PPE in handling any dead animals, isolating susceptible cattle, and practicing appropriate disposal techniques such as incineration or deep burial (AHA, 2017; FAO, 2016). Animals are able to be infected via spore-contaminated feed, water, soil or via vectors (scavengers and biting insects).
Other than advising caution in allowing livestock to drink from stagnant water sources and short grass, it is difficult to completely control these given farmers often need to allow animals to graze on whatever is available at the time. Thus, once again, emphasizing proper carcass management to reduce environmental contamination is imperative, encouraging farmers to ensure carcass protection from animal vectors and avoid the leakage of bodily fluids into water sources until they are able to contact an authoritative public health or veterinary body to assist proper incineration or burial the carcass (AHA, 2017; FAO, 2016). However, especially where farmers refuse to properly manage of infected carcasses, household awareness on basic hygiene and avoiding, or fully cooking, any potentially infected meat (FAO, 2016) may be the only other strategy in somewhat dampening the risk of zoonotic disease and safeguarding public health. It may be necessary to eventually provide monetary or resource based incentives to encourage reporting, proper animal management, vaccine use and cooperation with local health authorities (FAO, 2016). Health and veterinary authorities should continually monitor the enzootic outbreak to identify any other modes of transmission and strategies that may better control anthrax in these communities (FAO, 2016).
