Bovine tuberculosis surveillance system evaluation - Greater-Accra Region, Ghana, 2011

Abstract

Background: Bovine tuberculosis (BTB) is caused by Mycobacterium bovis. Developed countries have succeeded to control BTB infections and reduced its transmission to humans through the enforcement of meat inspection laws, test and slaughter/segregation of positive reactors, and milk pasteurisation. This was paralleled by a concomitant decrease in human tuberculosis infections (HTBI) from 5%-20% to 0.5%-1% in the past five decades. In developing countries, an estimated 10-15% of HTBI are attributed to M. bovis, however, weak control measures and under reporting of BTB may grossly underestimate this. Surveillance by the Veterinary Services Directorate (VSD) through meat inspection, voluntary reporting and periodic cattle screening with the objective to early detect and monitor trend for rapid intervention are the mainstay of control. Controlling BTB in cattle results in its reduction in humans; hence, we evaluated the BTB surveillance system in the Greater-Accra Region of Ghana to determine its performance and assessed the system's attributes.Methods & Materials: We interviewed stakeholders, reviewed veterinary monthly reports of all ten districts in the region, laboratory and screening records, and extracted surveillance data from national electronic database for the period 2006-2011 using the CDC Guidelines for Evaluation of Public Health Surveillance Systems.Results: From 2006-2011, 284/244,576 (0.12%) cattle slaughtered were suspected to have BTB; of which 7/284 (2.5%) were submitted and all laboratory-confirmed positive by Ziehl-Neelsen acid-fast stain test; predictive value positive (PVP) being 100%. From the suspected carcasses, there were 91 partial and 8 total condemnations. BTB detected at slaughter rose from 13 in 2006 to 78 in 2010, then dropped to 48 in 2011. Interviews suggest that about 50% of carcasses slip through inspection. Out of 3,367 cattle screened with tuberculin from eight farms, 97 (2.9%), tested positive and were culled. Ninety percent (9/10) of districts consistently submitted reports late to the region whereas 70% (7/10) made no reference to BTB. Regional and district data were manually stored with no electronic backups. Conclusion:The BTB surveillance system is sensitive, useful and monitors trend, however, timeliness, representativeness, completeness of reporting, and data quality need improvement. Non-reporting districts are now reporting following training.

Evaluation of surveillance system for post market activities on pre-packaged foods in Greater Accra Region, Ghana, 2021

“…The system was partially meeting its intended objectives. Some surveillance system evaluations conducted in Ghana for diseases have also concluded that the systems evaluated were not fully achieving their intended objectives [ [16] , [17] , [18] , [19] , [20] ]. A study in Brazil which used a different evaluation method to evaluate the Food and Nutrition Surveillance System (SISVAN) of the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil also concluded that the system was not being used to its full potential and that the data generated from the system was not used for planning, management and evaluation of nutrition services [34].…”