George Williams, 1/2/2024
The government needs 88 million vaccines to vaccinate all the 44 million animals. This was contained in a statement by Hon Frank Tumwebaze the Minister of Agriculture, Animal Industry & Fisheries.
According to Tumwebaze, 44 million animals require vaccination against Foot and Mouth Disease.
“This requires an annual vaccine stock of 88 million doses for the bi-annual vaccination requirement at a cost of US$2 per dose translating into US$176 million” said Tumwebaze.
However Tumwebaze said that in the next one or two months, the government is going to receive and dispatch 2.3m doses of the vaccine to these affected and susceptible districts for ring vaccination scale-up.
However the Nyabushozi County MP, Hon. Wilson Kajwengye said that ring vaccination is a lazy policy that comes after outbreak of the disease.
“This quarantine is not helping anything. You vaccinate to prevent the outbreaks of the disease. We are now looking at treatment and not inoculation” said Kajwengye.
Frank Tumwebaze acknowledged that quarantines are unpopular and an inconvenience to people’s livelihoods but yet again inevitable as temporary measures to control further spread to alarming and uncontrollable epidemic levels.
