Govt lifts foot-and-mouth disease quarantine in Jinja

JINJA | FOOT AND MOUTH | QUARANTINE | LIFTED

A partial quarantine that had been put in place in Jinja district's Buwenge town council and Buwenge sub-county has been abolished by the agriculture ministry.

This came after a foot-and-mouth disease outbreak in the two regions at the start of November, which forced a quarantine.

The ailment was mentioned in both cattle and goats, according to Dr. Anna Rose Ademun, the commissioner in charge of animal health at the agriculture ministry.

The disease has decreased as a result of the ministry's free vaccination campaign, which was launched in conjunction with the Jinja district veterinary department; Dr. Florence Nahamya announced the removal of the ban on Thursday at the Buwenge sub-county headquarters.

The principal veterinary officer for the Jinja area, Nahamya, congratulated farmers for adhering to the quarantine regulations, which among other things prohibited the transportation of animals and their slaughter as well as the selling and consumption of milk and meat.

While the butcher shops and the slaughterhouses were shut in both places, a source who requested anonymity said that some butchers secretly killed goats.

According to the source, locals continued to call some butchers and place orders, forcing them to slaughter goats and deliver the meat covertly.

Some avaricious locals, he claimed, "can't live without eating meat; they continued bugging butchers to come up with ways of obtaining them the meat."

Another insider was concerned that the lifting might have happened as a result of political pressure during the holiday season.

Alamanzani Oludu, a local journalist and member of the Buwenge Town Council, expressed his continued reluctance to consume meat, believing that the government may have lifted the prohibition prematurely.

For our protection, "I have already persuaded my family to accept, and we feast on fish," he remarked.

Moses Batwala, the LC5 chairperson for the Jinja district, urged animal traders to make sure they obtained their travel licenses to prevent butchering sick animals.

Since we have been informed that there is a decrease in the disease, he asked us to refrain from slaughtering sick animals. "This disease can be transmitted to people if they eat meat from sick animals," he said.

Additionally, Batwala requested that veterinary officers start the process of registering all butchers at the parish level and work with them to create rules that govern them.

He noted that this will aid in reducing the widespread animal theft that occurs in each community.

When there is a report of an animal disappearing, "we shall be able to identify their origins because the animals which are taken from our communities end up in butchers," he stated.