Prevalence of bovine tuberculosis at the SODEPA Douala abattoir, Cameroon (1995 – 2003)

Abstract

This paper reviews tuberculosis and other pathological cases of slaughtered cattle recorded in “SODEPA” ( Société de Développement et d'Exploitations des Productions Animales ) Douala abattoir from April 1995 – May 2003 to determine the status of Bovine tuberculosis and other pathological conditions in Zebu cattle. Out of a total of 385,784 (3782.20 ± 425.02) zebu cattle slaughtered during this period, 3,893 (20.17 ± 25.35) pathological lesions were recorded with 81.53 % (3174; 32.72 ± 30.30) of them being due to tuberculosis. Prevalence rates of 1.01% for all the cases put together, 0.82% for tuberculosis alone and 0.19% for the non-tuberculosis cases were obtained for the 8-year study period. The other 18.47% (719; 7.90 ± 5.80) of non-tuberculosis cases were made up of liver (76.77%), non-tuberculosis lung (10.29%), cysticercosis (5.98%), enlarged kidney (2.50%), traumatic (2.22%) and pericardiac (2.22%) lesions. Bovine tuberculosis lesions were generally 3 – 5 times more prevalent (P Keywords : Zebu cattle, pathological lesions, tuberculosis, prevalence, abattoir, Douala- Cameroon Cameroon Journal of Experimental Biology Vol. 1(2) 2005: 116-120