Epidemiological Insights into the Occurrence of Peste Des Petits Ruminants Virus (PPRV) Among Sheep, Goats and Cattle in Western Uganda

Abstract

Peste des Petits Ruminants (PPR) is a virulent trans-boundary disease caused by morbillivirus of the Paramyxoviridae family widespread in tropical and sub-tropical countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, Middle East and western and southern Asia. Serum samples were collected from cattle, goats and sheep from Kasese and Rubirizi districts, western Uganda and subjected to competitive ELISA. Prior to this sero-epidemiological study in 2016, PPRV was known to be limited to Karamoja pastoral area in North-eastern Uganda due to the large numbers of goats and sheep in this region hence the outbreaks; and cattle were never implicated. In this study sero-prevalences in goats (6.65%), Sheep (5.88%) and cattle (38.1%) were detected in South-western Uganda. This showed that PPR virus was distributed throughout Uganda, hence a need to create awareness amongst the farmers and veterinary stakeholders and scale out control measures country wide.