Adv. vaccines for livestock from Indian Council of Agricultural Research soon

Tirupati: Dr Joykrushna Jena, Deputy Director General (DDG) (Fisheries Science) at the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), said that protection of livestock wealth is helpful for maintaining the people’s health.

The livestock will provide nutritious food to people, he stated, calling the scientists to take up research on cattle health protection. The DDG said that the disease prevention in the livestock is the need of the hour.

He participated as a chief guest for the national-level symposium on ‘Innovation in animal health and current challenges and future perspectives’ held by the Sri Venkateswara Veterinary University (SVVU) at varsity auditorium here on Monday.

Dr Jena has announced that two advanced vaccines−thermostable for Peste des Petits Ruminants (PPR) disease for sheep and goats and multivalent−are being released soon in animal health sector.

He advised the scientists and microbiologists to work on improving the quality food products through livestock for protecting the people’s health, thus, improving health standards of nation’s population.

Prof P K Uppal, former Managing Director (MD) of DBT, Ministry of Science and Technology made an appeal to the scientists to make special testing kits for using in lab tests of livestock at grassroot level.

He stated that the kits are very helpful to farmers. SVVU Vice-Chancellor Dr Y Haribabu informed the participants that his varsity’s Microbiology department has released the blue-tongue and foot-rot disease vaccines and handed over them to the state government’s Animal Husbandry department for the benefit of farmers.

He appreciated the varsity scientists for inventing vaccines to prevent diseases in livestock. Symposium’s organising secretary Sridevi also spoke. More than 160 scientists have attended the symposium. SVVU Registrar Srinivasa Rao, Dr D Srinivasulu, Dr Ragava Rao and other officials were present.