Assessment of livestock health monitoring practices for vesicular disease prevention in cloven-hoofed animals

Introduction

Can early detection of vesicular diseases in livestock truly prevent catastrophic outbreaks, or do current monitoring frameworks fall short? Vesicular diseases, particularly foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) and vesicular stomatitis (VS), remain among the most economically damaging conditions affecting cloven-hoofed animals worldwide [1] . Blisters on the tongue, hooves, and teats lead to reduced milk yield, lameness, and death of young stock [2] . Trade restrictions triggered by confirmed outbreaks cost affected nations billions annually [3] . Turkey sits at a geographic crossroads between Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, and its livestock sector faces epidemiological pressures from multiple FMD serotypes circulating in neighbouring regions [4] . The country maintains roughly 18 million cattle and over 50 million small ruminants, many in smallholder systems with limited veterinary oversight [5] . While progressive vaccination campaigns have been implemented since the early 2000s, gaps in onfarm surveillance allow sporadic outbreaks [6] . Health monitoring quality varies enormously between large commercial operations with dedicated staff and smallholder farms relying on visual observation alone [7] . Prior surveys in North Africa and Southeast Asia showed fewer than 40% of smallholder farmers could correctly identify vesicular lesions [8,9] . Whether similar patterns hold in Turkey's mixed farming landscape hasn't been adequately examined. This research assessed monitoring practices in central Turkey, comparing compliance across farm types and identifying barriers at smallholder level.

Materials and Methods

Materials

This cross-sectional research was conducted at the Ankara Institute of Animal Health Sciences, Turkey, from March through November 2023. Ethical clearance was granted by the Institutional Animal Use and Research Ethics Board (Protocol AIHS-2023-017, approved 14 February 2023). A total of 126 farms participated: 68 largescale commercial operations (>200 head) and 58 smallholder units (<50 head), selected through stratified random sampling from the national livestock registry. Biological samples from 34 animals with suspected vesicular lesions were collected for laboratory confirmation.

Methods

Data collection used a 47-item structured questionnaire (Cronbach's alpha = 0.83) covering clinical inspection, temperature monitoring, lesion documentation, biosecurity compliance, and vaccination record-keeping [10] . On-site inspections followed a 28-point checklist adapted from WOAH guidelines [11] . Laboratory analysis used real-time RT-PCR for FMD virus detection [12] alongside complement fixation testing for VS virus. Statistical analyses used SPSS v26.0. Differences between farm types were tested with chisquare and independent t-tests (p < 0.05). Binary logistic regression identified factors associated with low monitoring compliance.

Results

The response rate was 93.4% (126/135 farms). Among participants, 54.0% kept cattle exclusively, 31.7% raised small ruminants, and 14.3% maintained mixed herds. Mean herd size was 387.2 ± 142.6 head for large-scale and 28.4 ± 11.7 head for smallholder operations.

Comprehensive Interpretation

Large-scale farms outperformed smallholder units across all monitoring domains by 17-35 percentage points. Farm type was the strongest predictor of low compliance (OR = 3.47), followed by distance to veterinary services (OR = 2.81). Of 34 suspected samples, 6 tested positive for FMD serotype O and 2 for VS virus, all from smallholder farms over 20 km from veterinary posts.

Discussion

The 25.6-point gap in daily inspection compliance between farm types mirrors patterns in other middle-income livestock sectors. Nampanya et al. [13] found a similar disparity in Lao PDR when comparing commercial and village-level operations. The mechanism is straightforward: large operations employ dedicated animal health staff, while smallholder owners split time across livelihood activities. Serological screening showed the steepest gap, which wasn't surprising given cost and logistical demands-governmentsubsidised programmes target commercial herds through scheduled campaigns, but smallholder farms in remote areas often fall outside these efforts [5,6] . Distance to veterinary facilities emerged as the second strongest predictor. Farms beyond 15 km showed 2.81 times higher odds of poor adherence, aligning with Knight-Jones and Rushton's [3] economic analysis. Mobile veterinary units or community-based animal health worker models may bridge this gap [14] . That vaccination compliance was strongest across both types likely reflects Turkey's long-running mandatory FMD programme. But high vaccination coverage alone doesn't guarantee disease freedom-the FMD-positive samples detected in our research underscore that surveillance must accompany vaccination [4,15] .

Limitations

This research covered only two central provinces and may not generalise to eastern or southeastern pastoral systems. Selfreported data risk social desirability bias, and single on-site visits captured snapshots rather than longitudinal patterns. The laboratory component was limited to clinically suspect animals, so subclinical infections may have gone undetected.

Conclusion

Acknowledgement

Acknowledgements Funding SourcesThis research received financial support from the Turkish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry under its livestock disease surveillance programme. Institutional SupportThe authors thank the Ankara Institute of Animal Health Sciences for laboratory facilities and provincial veterinary directorates for facilitating farm access. Contributions Not Qualifying for AuthorshipField veterinary officers who administered questionnaires and collected biological samples are gratefully acknowledged.

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