I receive many phone calls from communal farmers requesting help with sheep, goats or cattle that are ‘mysteriously dying’. My first question is: were the dead animals vaccinated beforehand?
The answer is often “Yes”. But when I ask a few more questions, I’m told that the livestock were ‘vaccinated’ with Ivermax, Ecomectin, or some other parasiticide.
While these are indeed important medicines that can be used to treat worms, mites, or sheep scab, they are not vaccines!
WHAT IS A VACCINE?
In very simple terms, a vaccine contains parts of the disease itself (albeit rendered harmless), and this enables the body to develop an immune response.
Put another way, the vaccine helps the body to produce antibodies ‘trained’ to identify a pathogen and act against it.
This story is from the April 23, 2021 edition of Farmer's Weekly.
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This story is from the April 23, 2021 edition of Farmer's Weekly.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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