New testing for foot and mouth disease in buffaloes

Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) and the Ministry of Livestock Development will next week start an extensive foot and mouth disease surveillance in buffaloes in the Maasai Mara, Laikipia and Tsavo areas.
These areas are known to have extensive wildlife-livestock interaction, hence possible disease transmission between them. The three-week exercise will begin in the Maasai Mara National Reserve and its environs in Narok County from Monday (February 20, 2012). This will be followed by Laikipia-Samburu ecosystem and finally Tsavo.
To capture the buffaloes for testing, KWS veterinarians dart the buffaloes with chemicals and take samples of blood and other samples to be submitted to a government foot and mouth disease laboratory in Embakasi, Nairobi, for analysis.
A total of 80 buffaloes are targeted for sampling, with about 25 – 30 buffaloes sampled in each area. The whole exercise is estimated to cost Kshs. 1.6 million and supported by the government laboratory.