PART II.—Treatment of Diseases.
5. Table 11 shows the number of deaths from contagious diseases
during the year.
6. 279 cases of deaths among equines and 12,847 among bovines were
reported against 373 and 7,637 of the previous year. The increase noticed,
is partly due to the fact that rinderpest has been more prevalent this year
than last, but part of this increase in number is due to the fact, that the
police have given more attention to reporting outbreaks and that with the
increase of staff more reports have been verified.
Equines.
7. Glanders.—There were 194 cases of deaths from this disease against
260 of the previous year. Of these 158 cases occurred in the Sodepore
Pinjrapole alone. The remaining 36 cases occurred in the districts of—
Howrah, 3 ; Hooghly, 4 ; Murshidabad, 4 ; Darjeeling, 1 ; Dacca, 1 ; Mymen-
singh. 14 and Rangpur, 9.
The most serious outbreaks were at
Mymensingh and Rangpur.
8. Rupees 1,339 were paid during the year as compensation for destruc-
tion of horses suffering from this disease, against Rs. 282 only of the previous
year. The maximum rate of such compensation. as originally sanctioned for
Western Bengal. was Rs. 50 for each horse. It was Rs. 100 in Eastern Bengal.
The latter rate has, however. been sanctioned by Government during the
year for the whole of the Province, in view of the fact. that the granting of
fair compensation will induce the owners to report to this Department the
existence of this disease more readily than was formerly the case and will
thus greatly facilitate the stamping out of the disease.
9. As regards the working of this Act. no complaints of any kind
referred to in the last year's report were received during the year from
Burdwan or any other municipalities. But some difficulties were met with
in the previous year in the district of Berhampore owing to certain technical
defects in the wording of the rules of the Glanders and Farcy Act. The
notifications and rules for the Glanders and Farcy Act are under revision,
for the Province, Calcutta and Port.
10. Anthrax.—Only 5 cases of deaths were reported from three districts.
In none of these cases was the existence of the disease confirmed by
bacteriological examination.
11. Surra.—Two cases are reported from Faridpur.
12. Other Diseases.—The number of deaths under this head was 78
against 102 of the previous year. Of these 74 occurred in the Sodepore
Pinjrapole alone. but the details thereof are not available.
Bovines.
13. Rinderpest.—This disease was somewhat more prevalent than last
year in all the districts of the Province and caused heavy losses. 10,318
deaths were reported against 5,154 of the previous year. Although the
disease appeared in a somewhat virulent form in the districts of Burdwan,
Midnapore. Hooghly. 24-Parganas, Murshidabad, Dacca, Mymensingh and
Pabna, very little could be done to prevent its spread, owing to the heavy
Hood in the first three districts and also to the failure of serum supply referred
to below.
14. Foot and Mouth.—Caused 610 deaths against 433 of the previous
year. This disease was less prevalent in all the districts during the year
except Darjeeling, where the outbreaks were most serious and 419 animals
are reported to have succumbed to it. As the losses from this disease are
comparatively small, and people pay small attention to it, little reliance can
be placed on these figures, and the extent of the prevalence of this disease
in any district, cannot be correctly estimated from them.
15. Hæmorrhagic Septicæmia.—Mortality under this head was 1,624
against 1,592 of the previous year. The outbreaks were rather severe in the
district of Bakarganj where 325 deaths were recorded against 110 of the
previous year.