ABSTRACT
Contributing to the rinderpest problem in Africa was the failure to keep sick animals from the healthy. Quite simply, quarantine can prevent the spread of many infectious diseases. A laboratory opened in Mali just 5 years ago has been researching, tracing, and producing vaccine for several diseases rampant in West African livestock —rinderpest and bovine pleuropneumonia. Foot-and-mouth disease is the most feared of all the animal diseases worldwide because of its ease and speed of spread and the susceptibility of all clovenhooved animals. Proper vaccines, a solid border inspection and quarantine program, and accurate diagnosis could take care of many of the most severe disease problems in the world. Most important before the animal disease situation in the Third World can improve, veterinary services will have to be strengthened. Veterinary technicians have no reliable means of communication or transportation–yet national animal health policy decisions are based on their input.
