Sero-prevalence and Risk Factors Study of Foot and Mouth Disease and Farmers Perception on Vaccinating Cattle against the Disease in Sidama Region, South Ethiopia

Foot and mouth disease (FMD) is a severe, highly contagious viral disease of livestock that has a significant economic impact. A cross-sectional study was conducted from September 2019 to June 2020 in three selected districts of Sidama region, southern Ethiopia with the objectives of determining the sero-prevalence of cattle against foot and mouth disease virus (FMDV), identifying potential risk factors and assessing farmers' perception on vaccination against FMD. Purposive and systematic random sampling techniques were employed to select the districts and study animals, respectively. A total of 510 cattle were tested for FMDV antibodies using 3ABC-ELISA. The overall cattle and herd level sero-prevalence were 15.5% and 24.7%, respectively. Among the considered risk factors age, herd size, and season were significantly associated with the sero-positivity of FMDV (P<0.05). Out of 120 farmers interviewed84.2% had never vaccinated their cattle against FMDV. Inaccessibility (83.7%) and unaffordable cost (72.1%) of the vaccine were mentioned as leading causes for the low vaccination practice in the current study areas. Majority of the respondents (68.3%) don’t perceive vaccinating cattle against FMDV as one of the preventive measures. In districts with lower perception of farmers on vaccinating their cattle against FMDV, higher sero-prevalence of the disease were recorded. The present serological and questionnaire survey indicated that the presence of FMD sero-positive animals in the current study area. Therefore, an integrated strategy for disease control has to be designed and implemented which could include enhancing farmers’ perception about the use of vaccination in preventing FMD and government provision of vaccines at an affordable cost to the farmers.