“The last three months have seen 50 sudden deaths of local cattle due to the BVD virus. We have appealed to the Kaur Livestock Farming Office to take urgent action in the field to combat this problem,” said Syamlan, a local villager aged 47, on Tuesday (12/05/2015).
He expressed his concern that if the BVD virus is not quickly eradicated by the local Livestock Farming Office (Disnak), sudden deaths of cattle in Kaur will continue to rise.
“People are alarmed, fearful that their cattle will die. This is because the BVD virus is carried in saliva and spreads very quickly to other cattle. So we hope that the Kaur Regency Government will deal with this virus quickly,” he said.
This would protect cattle belonging to others from the virus. “I have to say, even if only one cow dies, local citizens would suffer losses on the scale of ten to twenty million rupiah,” he said.
Adult cattle prices are currently quite high in Kaur, ranging from Rp 12 to Rp 15 million per head. “If two head of cattle were to die, local citizens would lose dozens of millions of rupiah,” he added.
Indeed, with the up-coming Eid-ul-Fitr festivities, prices are increasing sharply, due to rising demand in preparing for the Lebaran holiday season. “So if cattle die, we would indeed take very heavy losses,” said Herman, another local resident.
Meanwhile, Rahmat Fajar, Head of the Veterinary Health Department at the Kaur Livestock Farming Office, explained that to halt the spread of the BVD virus, his office had vaccinated local cattle against the BVD virus, particularly in disease-affected areas.
However, because the virus spreads very quickly, people are panicking that their cattle will die in vain. “Many local people are now selling off their cattle for fear the cattle will die in vain from the virus,” he said.
Fajar appealed to citizens to stay vigilant to attacks of this deadly virus on their cattle. Staying vigilant would enable any cattle showing symptoms of the BVD virus to be slaughtered instead of dying in vain and incurring heavy losses, he explained.