New Delhi: Baba Ramdev said Friday the Patanjali Group is working on finding solutions for Lumpy Skin Disease (LSD) that has caused death of around 1 lakh cows in India. Baba Ramdev suggested that the government should create awareness about the disease, which he alleged that might have ‘come from Pakistan’. Ramdev said the government should also investigate how the disease entered the country and spread across many states. “We are working on Lumpy Skin Disease virus and trying to find a medicine for it,” Ramdev told reporters here.
Ramdev said the disease also affected many cows in his shelter house at Haridwar. However, not even a single cow has died so far.
“We treated cows with ayurvedic medicines like Giloy. Cows having better immunity were not infected with this disease,” Ramdev said.
LSD in cows has spread in more than a dozen states, including Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana. The disease has affected 16.42 lakh cattle in 197 districts and has killed 75,000 animals between July and September 11, 2022, according to data maintained by the Department of Animal Husbandry.
LSD is a contagious viral disease that affects cattle and causes fever, nodules on the skin and can also lead to death. The disease is spread by mosquitoes, flies, lice, and wasps by direct contact among the cattle, and through contaminated food and water.
The Centre has said that goat pox vaccine, currently being administered on cattle to control the LSD, is 100 per cent effective. Two institutes of agri research body ICAR have developed a new vaccine ‘Lumpi-ProVacInd’ for the LSD, but it has not been commercially launched.
India, the world’s largest milk producer, had a cattle population of 192.5 million in 2019, as per the 19th Livestock census.