FG directs Abia to site veterinary clinic at Lokpanta market, warns of public health risks

The Federal Ministry of Livestock Development has warned that the shortage or absence of veterinary clinics and regulatory personnel at livestock markets and abattoirs could result in the sale of diseased and unwholesome meat to the public, thereby endangering the people’s health.

The Team Lead of of the Tsetse Fly Surveillance and Control Project from the Federal Ministry, Mr Gilbert Okoro, gave the advice in Abia State after his team concluded a verification exercise to assess tsetse fly infestation in the area.

The ministry then tasked the Abia government to establish more veterinary clinics, saying it would complement the existing ones.

He noted that the recommendation was to ensure that Abia meat consumers are not served from diseased livestock, saying the reccommendation follows intelligence gathered by his team regarding operations at the Lokpanta Cattle Market, the largest livestock trading hub in the southern region.

Okoro stressed that an unmonitored livestock market operating without a veterinary clinic and adequate manpower could undermine the administration’s achievements in healthcare, describing the state’s failure to site the federal veterinary clinic,originally allocated for the State at Lokpanta Cattle Market hub, as a dangerous political mistake.

“Lokpanta is a cattle marketing hub, and all the livestock consumed across the entire South arrive at Lokpanta before distribution to other states in the South-East and South-South.

“Consequently, there is an urgent need for continuous tsetse fly control because we recorded a high harvest of tsetse flies around these areas during our surveillance.

“Abia should replicate this control programme, especially around those axes. There is also a vital need for more veterinary clinics, which will not burden the state financially but will drastically assist its health sector in keeping the public safe,” Okoro said.