Annual Report

NOTE

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• *2 :

I. New activities of the veterinary services
The new computerized Animal System, which includes the National Cattle Identification Database, had been completed, and is gradually coming into effect.

II. Comments on specific List A diseases
1. Foot and mouth disease
No cases of FMD have been reported since 09/1999. Israel continues with the policy of annual vaccination, all cattle above the age of 3 months are vaccinated with a triple vaccine (against O1, A22, Asia1), a booster is given 2 to 8 weeks after the first vaccination to calves under the age of 18 months. The sheep and goats are vaccinated annually with mono-valent O vaccine.

2. Peste des petits ruminants
Four outbreaks were reported during 2003, compared to none in the previous year. Sheep and goats are vaccinated annually from the age of 4 months.

3. Sheep pox and goat pox
Nine outbreaks were reported compared to 6 in 2002. Vaccination of all sheep is carried out in high-risk areas.

4. Newcastle disease
Twelve outbreaks were reported in 2003 in commercial flocks, compared to 20 in the previous year. Law requires Newcastle vaccination of all poultry in Israel, yet all affected flocks were destroyed, quarantine measures were taken and monitoring had been carried out.

III. Comments on specific List B diseases
1. Rabies
Sixty-nine cases of rabies were recorded in 2003 compared to 64 in the previous year. No cases were diagnosed in the area of 5000 km2 in the north of the country where oral vaccination of wild animals had been carried out in an in the last five years. With a larger budget available, The Israel Veterinary Services extended the vaccination program to the rest of the country. Most cases in 2003 were recorded in areas adjoining the PA, in which territory the program could not be applied because of security limitations.

2. Bovine spongiform encephalitis
The first and only BSE case in Israel was diagnosed on 29 May 2002 in a dairy cow, born in 1992, showing clinical CNS symptoms.
All 21,335 slaughtered cows tested before entering the food chain, as well as 1392 fallen stock and 38 cows showing nervous clinical symptoms tested in 2003 had been found negative for BSE.

3. Scrapie
No cases were recorded in 2003. The disease had been diagnosed in 2002 for the first time since 1996 in 3 herds of sheep, which were destroyed.

IV. Comments on other diseases
1. Bovine ephemeral fever
No cases were diagnosed in both 2002 and 2003 after the disease had severely affected both dairy and beef herds for the previous three years. Active surveillance for antibodies also failed to diagnose new infections in 2003.

2. West Nile Fever
No cases were had been recorded since 2002 in commercial geese flocks although monitoring of sentinels, the diagnosis of the virus in both migrating and local wild birds and in mosquitoes confirmed the virus-vector activity in 2003. The absence of the disease from the commercial geese flocks could be attributed to the efficient compulsory vaccination of all geese with a killed WNF vaccine developed in the Kimron Veterinary Institute, and the intensive anti-mosquitos campaign carried out by the Ministry of the Environment,