ABORTION IN COWS.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19676, 20 July 1929, Page 17

ABORTION IN COWS.

NO DIRECT REMEDY. Aa far as research and investigation have been conducted up to the present time, there ia no direct remedy for abortion. So says a Canadian farm paper. It is conceded to be the worst scourge that the eattle industry has to contend with, and investigations as to its history and likely remedies are still being undertaken by veterinary science. Only preventive measures can be taken meantime, with the knowledge we now have. The fact that infectious abortion is caused by a germ that lives varying periods of time in material which is discharged from the bodies of its necessitates that healthy cattle should be kept under conditions that will prevent their exposure to drainage from fields, pens, barns, etc., occupied by diseased cattle, or those that have come in contact with affected animals. Cattle should be protected against exposure to infected material which dogs may earry or drag home, such as aborted foßtuaes, or portions of afterbirth. It is a most insidious disease. An exceedingly important danger against which the healthy herd should be protected is the apparently healthy carrier and disseminator of disease germs. Hence when it is intended to make additions to the healthy herd, remember that cows that have never aborted and have never shown breeding troubles may be far from safe or harmless. Abortion disease undoubtedly has been spread repeatedly by cows that were bought, segregated until after they had produced normal calves in a normal manner, and then turned into healthy herds, on the mistaken assumption that normal calving is sufficient to prove that a cow is not a carrier of abortion bacilli.

A eow may carry her calf to nearly the full time and the calf may be siekly after birth, and survive, though affected with the abortion bacilli. Affected cows, however, generally abort the foetus at the fifth, sixth, or seventh months of the gestation period. When abortion occurs at these periods the calf is generally dead, and the discharge is a source of infection to other cows and should be burned, and the whole place cleaned and thoroughly disinfected. A sample of blood can be taken from each cow and heifer, in order to ascertain the presence of abortion bacilli, but this work can be undertaken only by a qualified veterinarian.