Tropical Animal Health

Course goals

The course aims to create a clear perspective of veterinary health in low and middle income countries, which is necessary to place tropical animal health into a broader socio-economical context. The course consists of lectures, group work, practicals and the creation of knowledge clips. Most lectures and group work sessions will be provided by visiting experts from all over the world who have a strong (field) experience in the tropics, and who like to share their experience!

Content

This course will provide students insight into the peculiar and unique aspects of animal health and livestock management in the tropics. Animal health in tropical countries is facing specific challenges, unique for each country, like working in a resource-poor environment, an underdeveloped system for veterinary services, political instability, and the presence of specific (infectious) diseases, including zoonoses.
The course will address the management and veterinary care of livestock, and the aspects of the livestock-wildlife-human interface. During the course several important tropical infectious diseases will be discussed, in order to gain insights in epidemiology, ways of transmission, pathogenesis, diagnostics and therapeutics. Special attention will go to control and prevention strategies (vaccine development, early warning systems, etc.) and the role of the vectors in transmission of some major tropical animal diseases and zoonoses in resource poor countries.
The role of major international organizations dealing with animal health and zoonotic spillover in developing countries (e.g. WHO, FAO, OIE) and the contributing role of veterinarians in those organizations will be highlighted during the course.