CONTAGNIOUS BOVINE PLEUROPNEUMONIA (CBPP)
Pleuropneumonia
was introduced into South Africa by means of a Friesland bull imported from
Holland and landed at Mossel Bay in 1854.
Although legislation dealing with the disease was passed by the Cape
Government during the previous year (Ordinance No. 1 of 1853), the regulations
were not properly carried out and several local herds of cattle became
infected. As no restrictions were placed
on the traffic in cattle, the disease was carried in all directions
particularly by means of trek oxen. The
infection was so virulent that over a hundred thousand animals succumbed to it
within two years. The scourge rapidly
gained a stronghold and remained enzootic in various parts of south Africa, and
continued to prevail as the most destructive disease of bovines until 1896,
when it was completely overshadowed by rinderpest (Brandford, 1877; Report of
Cattle and Sheep Diseases Commission, 1877; Hutcheon, 1981; Theiler,
1899). But after the eradication of
rinderpest, lungsickness again assumed serious proportions. After the South African War a united policy
for the suppression of lungsickness was adopted by the governments of the
different states. The most stringent
quarantine regulations were enforced, all affected animals were slaughtered,
and the incontacts inoculated. Fewer
and fewer outbreaks occurred, and the existing infected areas were gradually
reduced in size and numbers. By the
time of Union (1910) both the Free State and Natal were clean, but the scourge
persisted in the Native Territories of the Cape and the bushveld of the
Transvaal (Gray, 1911). In 1915 only
two outbreaks occurred in the Transvaal, in the Rustenburg area; only one in
the Cape Province, near Kingwilliamstown; and three in the Transkei (Gray,
1917). After 1916 no fresh outbreaks of
pleuropneumonia were recorded in the Union until 1921, when a serious outbreak
occurred on the Waterberg-Zoutpansberg border as a result of an illicit
introduction of cattle from Bechuanaland (Borthwick, 1921). But the scourge was immediately
eradicated. Up to the present the
country has remained entirely free from the disease.
It is not clear
when the first outbreak of lungsickness occurred in the Transvaal, but there is
no doubt that the disease made its appearance soon after its introduction at
Mossel Bay. According to the Bloemhof
Bluebook (1871) the disease apparently was very prevalent long before 1869,
when the Batlaping chief, Mahurah, in trying to avoid a demand for cattle,
stated that lungsickness had destroyed most of his cattle.
According to
information obtained by Sinclair (1922) from the late Rev. J.S. Moffat,
lungsickness made its first appearance in Matabeleland in 1861, having been
introduced by a European trader coming from the south. The disease rapidly assumed an epizootic
character, causing severe losses amongst the native cattle, and soon extended
over the greater part of the country.
In 1900 an ordinance for the suppression of lungsickness was passed in
Rhodesia. The result has been that,
apart from an isolated outbreak in 1912, Southern Rhodesia has been free from
pleuropneumonia since 1904, the disappearance of the scourge being attributed
partly to the control measures adopted, and partly to the destruction of
carriers by East Coast fever.
Pleuropneumonia,
lung. (Onderstepoort collection).
PARATYPHOID
IN CALVES (SALMONELLA DUBLIN)
In South Africa
Hutcheon (1893) was the first to report a disease of calves that can be
regarded as paratyphoid. This disease
was apparently identical with the condition described as Lewersiekte (liver
disease) or “yellow liver” by Otto Henning (1894). Hutcheon thought that infection was spread from farm to farm by
means of the faeces of infected calves.
The etiology of this disease was elucidated by Viljoen and Martinaglia
(1928) and Henning (1939).
Paratyphoid. Calf.
(Onderstepoort collection).
SPIROCHAETOSIS IN PIGS
Cleland (1908)
found spirochaetes in the abscesses that developed in castration wounds of
pigs. According to Knuth and Du Toit
(1921) and Wenyon (1926) several different investigators have found
spirochaetes in pigs under different conditions; some observed the organisms in
the blood of pigs suffering from swine fever, while others detected
spirochaetes in the intestinal lesions of pigs that had died from the same
disease. Some authors associated the
spirochaetes with the etiology of swine fever, while others attributed some of
the secondary lesions to this organism.
On the other hand, spirochaetes which appeared to be non-pathogenic have
been found on the mucous membrane of the large intestine of healthy pigs.
In South Africa
the disease was first recorded in the vicinity of Pretoria by dodd (1906), but
later cases of spirochaetosis were recorded in other parts of the Transvaal,
and also in the Free State, Natal and Cape Province.
Cryptococcus
infection. Horse. (Onderstepoort collection).
LEPTOSPIROSIS
Although comparatively very little work has been done on leptospirosis in Africa, there is some evidence that it occurs in various parts of the continent, and there are indications that the disease is much more widespread than it is generally realized. Thus Kadaner and Corti (1933) and Schwetz and Kadaner (1934) described an outbreak of Weil’s disease among a number of Europeans who had used a certain swimming bat in Stanleyville. No more cases appeared when the baths were closed. The blood of the patients gave a high agglutination titre with L. icterochaemorrhagiae. Van Riel (1946)later isolated 21 strains of Leptospirae in the Lake Kivu area of the Belgian Congo. Amongst these he identified L. grippotyphosa, L. bataviae, L. canicola and L. icterhaemorrhagiae. In Kenya Piercy (1951) described a number of cases of canine leptospirosis due to the classical strain. He was able to demonstrate parasites in sections of orgas from laboratory animals infected with material from affected dogs. The symptoms described resembled those reported by Okell, Dalling and Pugh (1925).
The first positive proof of leptospirosis in South Africa was furnished by Malherbe and Kaschula (1953). By means of biological, serological and histological methods they were able to show that some dogs at the Onderstepoort clinic, manifesting symptoms resembling the “Stuttgart syndrome” were infected with Leptospirae, either L. canicola or L. seroe.
BLACKQUARTER (SPONSSIEKTE)
CLOSTRIDIUM CHAUVOEI
In South Africa sponssiekte has been known to be one of the most prevalent diseases in bovines since the time of the earliest European settlement of the Cape, its prevalence being constantly referred to by some of the first travelers in South Africa. As early as 1780 Le Vaillant (1795) encountered a “terrible scourge, sponssiekte, which causes speedy destruction of more than half the herd”. The flesh of the affected animal (“infant”) “swells extraordinarily and grows spongy; it becomes filled with a reddish, viscous humor”. At the beginning of the last century Commissioner de Mist frequently alluded to sponssiekte as one of the most common disease amongst the cattle of the settlers in the Cape (Theal, 1911).
No mention was
ever made of the existence of anthrax, and it would appear that sponssiekte was
well known as a distinct disease with a widespread distribution, long before
there was any evidence of the existence of anthrax. The fact that the malady encountered by the early settlers
affected only young animals suggests that it was identical with blackquarter.
The first
official reference to the occurrence of sponssiekte was made by Commissioner de
Mist in 1805 (Theal 1911). In 1877 it
was one of the diseases reported by the Stock Diseases Commission, and in 1883
Hutcheon encountered it in several parts of the Cape and the Transkei. Wiltshire (1882) mentioned “Spon-sickness”
as one of the different forms of anthrax occurring in Natal, stating that it
affected mostly young animals, especially those in the most thriving condition.
Although there
is no doubt that sponssiekte has existed in both the Transvaal and the Orange
Free State for a considerable period, the vaccination was first attempted in
the Transvaal in 1893 and four years later in the Free State. As early as 1883 blackquarter powder vaccine
was imported into Natal by Wiltshire.
After 1887 attempts at the preparation of a reliable vaccine were made
at the Grahamstown Laboratory, and the vaccine issued during the same year from
that laboratory was found by Hutcheon to be effective. In the year 1898 the preparation of vaccine
was commenced in Natal, but in the Transvaal Theiler first made blackquarter
vaccine in 1905.
Blackquarter
muscle. (Onderstepoort collection.)