Tag Archives: Trypanosomiasis

Animal Health / Cattle / Diagnostics / Disease Control / East Africa / ILRI / Kenya / Markets / Pastoralism / Vulnerability

Kenya is working towards disease-free livestock zones to improve its livestock trade

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Herding cattle in Kenya (photo on Flickr by davida3 [Davida De La Harpe]). ‘The [Kenya] government has unveiled a plan to improve trade in livestock by vaccinating 61 million livestock in the next financial year. ‘According to budget estimates released on Thursday, the animals will be vaccinated against foot and mouth disease and other trade-sensitive diseases. … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Health / Disease Control / Epidemiology / ILRI / RVF

‘Zoonoses’–diseases that pass from animals to humans–are again making headlines

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An initiative called the Dynamic Drivers of Disease in Africa Consortium, which is hosted by the UK’s STEPS Centre, at the Institute of Development Studies, in Brighton, issued a news release today regarding the science and poverty implications of transmissions of animal-to-human diseases. This comes upon reports by UK officials this week of a the … Continue reading →

A4NH / Canada / East Africa / Epidemiology / Event report / Farming Systems / Food Security / Geodata / ICT / Livestock / Poultry / RVF / Seeds / Uganda / Zambia / Zimbabwe

New consortium to investigate environmental changes spreading diseases between animals and people in Africa

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Malawi crop-and-livestock farmer (photo credit: ILRI/Susan MacMillan). One of the drivers of disease in Africa, a continent with a particularly heavy disease burden, are environmental changes that help to spread infectious pathogens between animals (both wild and domestic) and people. That is why the start of a new research program, in which the International Livestock … Continue reading →

Disease Control / ECF / Film and video / Genetics / ILRI / Kenya / Research / Zoonotic Diseases

Driven by technology, (finally) embracing diversity: A geneticist’s views on the evolution of biotech research at ILRI

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For the November 2011 ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ event at ILRI, Steve Kemp, a livestock molecular geneticist, reflects on the evolution of ILRI’s research agenda and the role of biotechnology research in that agenda . . . Steve Kemp first came to the Nairobi campus of the International Livestock research Institute (ILRI) in 1985 when it was … Continue reading →

Capacity Strengthening / East Africa / Tanzania / Women

East African women battling livestock diseases win prestigious AWARD Fellowships

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Lillian Wambua, a 2011 African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD) fellowship winner working at ILRI, announced 18 August 2011 (photo credit: ILRI/ Njiru). ‘The African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (Award) yesterday named three East African women among 70 brilliant African researchers who have won its 2011 Award Fellowship. ‘. . . … Continue reading →

A4NH / Africa / Agri-Health / Animal Diseases / Article / Cattle / Disease Control / Genetics / Human Health / ILRI / Indigenous Breeds

An African cattle disease, disease-resistant cow and disease control solution

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The tsetse fly, which spreads the livestock disease trypanosomosis (photo credit: ILRI/Elsworth). Aid Netherlands has picked up news of a paper published last month in a leading scientific journal about a breakthrough in determining the genes responsible for controlling a tsetse fly-transmitted disease of livestock that has devastated Africa, and held back farming on the … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Diseases / Biotechnology / Cattle / Film and video / ILRI / Indigenous Breeds / Kenya / Research / UK / Zoonotic Diseases

‘New science’ is ‘networked science’: The data-crunching workflows and pipelines behind a recent gene discovery

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The single-celled parasite Trypanosoma brucei (appearing in blue), which causes sleeping sickness in humans and trypanosomiasis in livestock, amongst the red blood cells of its mammalian host (photo credit: Parasite Museum website). Having been domesticated in Africa some 8,000 or more years ago, the N’Dama, the most ancient of African cattle breeds, has had time to … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Diseases / Disease Control / Livestock

Researchers make progress toward finding a new cure for nagana-infected livestock

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In Zulu, “nagana” means “depressed in spirits.” To many poor farmers in sub-Saharan Africa, however, nagana is more than just an emotion—it’s a disease that plagues their livestock, exacerbating poverty and hunger in the region. But researchers in Belgium may soon have something to raise the temperaments of African farmers: a drug aimed at curing … Continue reading →

Animal Health / East Africa / Emerging Diseases / Human Health / Livestock / Uganda

Further spread of Rhodesian sleeping sickness in Uganda likely due to livestock movements

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The northwards spread of human Rhodesian sleeping sickness in Uganda is likely due to the movement of infected livestock, according to new findings from an interdisciplinary research group including members from the Centre for Infectious Diseases, University of Edinburgh; the Ministry of Health, Uganda; and the Universities of Oxford and Southampton. The current study, published … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Animal Diseases / Animal Health / East Africa / Kenya / Research

In Kenya, better cows for better health

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A parasite researcher from NYU is hoping to tackle African sleeping sickness in Kenya by creating genetically enhanced cows that cannot catch or transmit the disease. Jayne Raper believes that to truly help people, sometimes you have to start with another species. In this case, cows. Unlike Raper, a parasite researcher at New York University, most … Continue reading →