IVRI vaccines for cattle diseases

Indian veterinarians have achieved a major breakthrough in evolving vaccines against two of the most dreaded diseases of livestock that cause huge annual losses through animal mortality.

These diseases are PPR viral disease that kills the animals by affecting their intestines and respiratory system and the foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) that is playing havoc with livestock all over the world. The vaccines have been evolved by the researchers of the Izatnagar (UP)-based Indian Veterinary Research Institute (IVRI).

IVRI Vice-Chancellor-cum-Director MP Yadav told Business Standard that PPR was a major menace for sheep and goats, causing 50 to 70 per cent mortality among the sick animals. The annual loss due to this disease alone was estimated at over Rs 240 million.

This disease is quite similar to the rinderpest disease that has now been eradicated from India.

"The vaccine used to ward off rinderpest also gave protection against the PPR disease. But after being declared and recognised globally as rinderpest-free country, India could not use the rinderpest vaccine under the international norms. This had necessitated evolution of a new vaccine for this disease," Yadav said.

The PPR vaccine developed by the IVRI is the world's second vaccine found effective against this disease. The earlier one, however, not effective in India as it was evolved specifically for the strain of virus prevalent in Africa. The IVRI vaccine was meant to cope with the Indian strain of PPR virus, he said.

The IVRI had already licensed two companies for commercial production of this vaccine. These are Indian Immunologicals, Hyderabad, and Intervet, Pune. The institute had imparted training to these companies' personnel in preparing this vaccine. The commercial production is likely to begin after getting the drug controller's nod.

"In fact, the IVRI has gone a step further and developed two diagnostic kits for early diagnose of this disease. However, the technology for manufacturing these kits was yet to be passed on to commercial manufacturers," Yadav said.

Talking about the FMD vaccine, Yadav said it was in advanced stages of development and testing. The IVRI had used local ingredients to bring down the cost of this vaccine. The volume of a dose needed to be given to the animals would be relatively much smaller in the case of the IVRI vaccine.

The FMD was a serious animal disease found throughout the world. India had drawn up an elaborate programme to eradicate it from the country.

To begin with, this campaign would be conducted in 54 districts in some selected states, including Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.

Of the four strains of FMD-causing pathogens, one (called virus C) had already been eradicated from India. The new vaccine would be effective against the remaining three strains, Yadav pointed out.