Kitgum District Veterinary Officer Dr. Alfred Kinyera says they have only been using the cold chain for vaccine storage while the rest of the equipment hasn’t been used due to lack of a specialist to operate them.
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Farmers grazing their cattle in Labongo Amida Subcounty in Kitgum District were a mass vaccination against blackquarter disease was conducted recently.
Kitgum District multi-million veterinary laboratory is lying idle
due to a lack of a qualified specialist to operate it.
The laboratory was constructed by OXFAM and handed to the district local
government in 2008 to enhance animal health and improve livestock
production. It is equipped with a cold chain for vaccine storage,
incubators, a centrifuge, a microscope among others.
However, 12 years later after its commissioning, the laboratory hasn’t fully
operational.
Kitgum District Veterinary Officer Dr Alfred Kinyera says they have only been
using the cold chain for vaccine storage while the rest of the equipment hasn’t
been used due to the lack of a specialist to operate them.
He says the district hasn’t been able to employ a specialist since its
inception, leaving simple and complicated animal sample tests to be conducted
outside the district.
Dr Kinyera says animal samples requiring tests that would have been easily
conducted at the Laboratory are now referred to National Animal Disease
Diagnostics and Epidemiology Centre (NADDEC) Laboratories Entebbe, Gulu
Regional Veterinary laboratory or Makerere University.
He says the absence of a laboratory specialist have negatively impacted on the
diagnosis of animal diseases adding treatment are sometimes based on clinical
signs and not laboratory test results.
“When you treat based on laboratory confirmation, you are sure. But currently,
the treatment is based on guesswork. This is also sometimes why the response to
disease control is low,” Dr Kinyera told Uganda Radio Network in an interview.
The veterinary department is also faced with limited personnel according to Dr
Kinyera. There are only five assistant veterinary officers in the district who
currently provide veterinary extension services to all the 22 sub-counties.
Kitgum District Production officer Alfred Omony acknowledges that the district
hadn’t recruited a laboratory technician for long to ensure full operation of
the veterinary laboratory.
Omony attributes the challenges to the low wage bill by the government which is
unable to support the recruitment and remuneration of a laboratory specialist.
According to Omony, when the government increased the wage bill in the last
financial year, they were instead tasked to prioritize the recruitment of a
principal veterinary officer, an entomologist and a senior agricultural
engineer.
“If we had the money to support their payment, we would have recruited a
Laboratory specialist already. Money is our problem,”
He says the district is also lacking a laboratory specialist to operate a
multi-million mini crop disease and pest diagnostic laboratory which is
currently also lying idle.
The mini-laboratory was established in 2015 by the Ministry of Agriculture,
Animal Industry and Fisheries under the Peace Recovery and Development
Program-PRDP.
Kitgum District is currently facing an outbreak of a suspected African swine
fever –ASF that has so far killed more than 600 pigs in Labongo Akwang
Sub-county.
Omony says diagnosis for such a strange disease would have been easily done
through laboratory tests conducted from the Laboratory in the district if they
had a laboratory specialist.
Unless the government releases a wage bill high enough and prioritizes the
recruitment of a veterinary Laboratory specialist, the veterinary Laboratory
will remain idle, according to Omony.
