Roger Daniel

Outbreak of tuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium bovis in golden Guernsey goats in Great Britain.

An outbreak of caprine tuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium bovis was disclosed in June 2008, affecting goats of the golden Guernsey breed kept on 10 separate smallholdings in south-west Wales and the west of England. Following the initial diagnosis at postmortem examination, 30 goats that reacted positively to the single intradermal comparative cervical tuberculin (SICCT) test, together with five in-contact animals, were euthanased and subjected to postmortem examination and mycobacterial culture. Spoligotyping and variable number tandem repeat analysis of isolates showed that they were all of the same genotype, endemic to south-west Wales. Retrospective movement tracings identified a goat herd in south-west Wales, by then completely dispersed, as the probable common source of infection. There was a perfect correlation between the SICCT test and culture results in all slaughtered goats. Grossly visible tubercular lesions were observed at postmortem examination in all but one reactor.

TB in goats caused by Mycobacterium bovis

SIR, — We would like to report a severe outbreak of tuberculosis (tb) caused by Mycobacterium bovis in golden Guernsey goats. Reports of caprine tb have been very rare in the uk since the introduction of a mandatory tb testing and slaughter scheme for cattle herds in the 1950s. However, the extent

Faecal egg count reduction test to detect lack of efficacy of triclabendazole

We wish to inform colleagues that a faecal egg count reduction test to assess the efficacy of the flukicide triclabendazole in sheep flocks will be offered by the Veterinary Laboratories Agency (VLA) and the Veterinary Parasitology Research Group, University of Liverpool. The test is a modification

Pathological observations of tick-borne fever and intercurrent bacterial infections in lambs

Eighteen lamb deaths were recorded in a group of 250 ewes and lambs, following turnout onto newly rented upland pasture, in the spring of 2016. Three lambs were presented for postmortem examination and found to have heavy tick infestations. Some of the lesions found grossly at postmortem examination were similar to those described in a single lamb investigated by the Wales Veterinary Science Centre at Aberystwyth during the spring of 2015, from a different farm. Gross lesions identified in these three lambs included splenomegaly, lymphadenopathy, pneumonia, fibrinous pericarditis, pleurisy, peritonitis and meningitis. Laboratory findings included positive PCR results for Anaplasma phagocytophilum, the causal organism of tick-borne fever (TBF), in all three lambs, and secondary bacterial infections. This report describes a range of lesions, some of which are different to those commonly associated with TBF infection. The pathogenesis and means of diagnosis are also discussed.

Drenching gun injuries in cattle

DRENCHING gun injuries are well recognised in sheep and have been clearly shown to pose a threat to the health and welfare of sheep in the UK (Harwood and Hepple 2011). In cattle, liver fluke infection is associated with the widespread use of anthelmintic products to reduce the impact of infection on production, particularly in dairy cattle (Howell and others 2015). We wish to report on three cases of dosing gun injury, with fatal outcome, for three dairy farms where cattle were treated for liver fluke. On the first farm, three cows in a 130-cow dairy herd had died in a week, with the first two to die showing reduced milk yield and some coughing. One of these was examined at the knackers yard and had a large amount of blood in its ‘stomach’. Coughed up blood had been noted on …