Abstract
A cross-sectional study was carried out from November 2010-April 2011 to determine the prevalence and distribution of salmonella isolates from apparently healthy sheep and goats slaughtered at Addis Ababa Abattoir enterprise, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A total of 384 sheep and goats were randomly selected and examined for the presence of salmonella in liver, kidney, spleen, carcass, mesenteric lymph node and feces. Three hundred eighty four samples of liver (0.00%), kidney (0.00%), spleen (0.00%), muscle (0.00%), carcass (0.00%), mesenteric lymph node (1.9%) and feces (5.3%) were examined. The isolation and identification of salmonella were carried out according to the technique recommended by the Standard Technique. Out of 384 samples, a total of 4 (1.04%) salmonella were isolated of which 1.5% (n=200) and 0.5% (n=184) were from sheep and goats respectively. Out of the positive isolates, 2(2.6%) and 1(3.6%) were from faeces and mesenteric lymph node of sheep and 1(3.7%) was from feces of goats. The result revealed that there was no statistically significant difference (p>0.05) in the prevalence of salmonella between male (1.14%) and female (1.79%) sheep and male (100%) and female (0.00%) goats. There was also no statistical significant difference between adult (1.96%) and young (1.02%) sheep and also between adult (100%), and young (0.00%) goats. The prevalence of salmonella in sheep (1.5%) and in goat (0.54%) was not significantly associated (p>0.005). Finally, the result of present study shows that unhygienic practices of workers resulted in contamination of mesenteric lymph node and the possibilities of cross contamination between positive animal and healthy ones. Although the present study shows the low prevalence of salmonella in the study area, the important impacts of salmonellosis on sheep and goats' production and productivity should not be neglected. Therefore, emphasis should be given to control the disease.
Highlights
Sheep and goats are the most numerous domestic livestock that are especially important in the extreme climates of the world
Despite the increase in the number of positive samples for salmonella in adult sheep (1.96%) as compared to young (1.02%), there was no significant statistical association (P=0.584, x2=0.299). while there was only one positive sample from goats which was positive for salmonella (Table 2)
There was an increase in the prevalence of salmonellosis in sheep 3(1.5%, n=200) as compared to goats 1(0.54%, n=184)
Summary
Sheep and goats are the most numerous domestic livestock that are especially important in the extreme climates of the world. In spite of the presence of a huge small ruminant population, Ethiopia fails to optimally exploit these resources. This has been determined due to number of technical and non-technical factors including ill-health, poor production, infrastructure and inadequate managerial knowledge of the owners health disorders in all classes of small ruminants represents the major problems that greatly affect the economy of sheep and goats production [4]. In spite of high demands from imports, the country has been supplying less amount of livestock and livestock products not because of lack of resource but due to certain infrastructural defects such as small numbers of standard export abattoir as compared to huge livestock number, uncontrolled expansion of illegal trading of livestock, presence of various zoonotic and epidemic disease as well as food borne illness [5]
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