A review of animal disease prevention in 2014

On 10 February 2014, the Vice Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Vu Van Tam chaired a meeting to review livestock disease prevention in 2014 of the National Steering Committee for Prevention and Control of Avian Influenza.

In the meeting, Mr. Pham Van Dong, the Director of the Department of Animal Health delivered a summary of the global diseases situation and the particular situation in Vietnam during the past year. In 2014, outbreaks were reported in 158 villages/wards in 93 districts of 33 provinces/cities. There were 212,600 infections and 101,900 deaths recorded. In comparison with the same period last year, the number of outbreaks, dead and culled poultry increased 3 times this year, however, the number of affecte birds accounted for only a small percentage of total poultry at 0.017%. Some influenza A/H5N6 cases were detected in several mountainous provinces in the central and the northern regions. There is no evidence at this time suggesting the circulation of influenza A/H7N9 in Vietnam.

About the Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) situation in pigs, there were 81 outbreaks in 81 villages in 31 districts of 13 provinces recorded in 2014, causing 2,978 infections and 172 deaths. Compared to that of 2013, the FMD zone was narrower this year, and the number of affected villages was approximately halved and the number of culled cattle dropped by 7 times, most cases were in buffalo.

In 2014, 29 provinces reported suspected dog rabies cases within which 128 dogs were culled. With regard to human rabies prevention and treatment, post-exposure rabies prophylaxis was applied to around 333,343 people bitten by dogs. There were 61 deaths distributed in 29 provinces and cities, a decrease of 31 cases compared to 2013.

Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome(PRRS) in pig recorded a prevention recorded a notable achievement as the disease has remained under absolute control since July 2013. No detection of PRRS cases has been reported throughout the country since that date.

In the upcoming period, infectious diseases, especially those circulating in poultry still pose a significant threat to public health. Therefore, the National Steering Committee members reached consensus on conducting Viet Nam’s transformation from passive to active disease prevention in order to minimize infectious zoonotic diseases, which also contributes to livestock production growth. Besides, the Vice Minister also emphasized the need to strengthen the implementation of a One Health approach in diseases prevention and control.

In addition to the inter-sector cooperation among the ministries represented in the National Steering Committee, the most important determinant of effective prevention is the active participation of local authorities at all levels. The actual situation has shown that timely response to scattered outbreaks in different locations by local authorities played a role in preventing wider spread of disease.

According to Mr. Pham Van Dong, on the veterinary side, directions will be provided from the local level upwards in order to have early detection of shortcomings and challenges, and to have timely responses. This strategy derives from recent inspection results which indicate that effective work by farmers and provincial veterinary staff would contribute to effective prevention nationwide.