Haematological Indices of Broiler Chickens Administered Water Containing Medicinal Plant Leaf Methanol Extract

The discovery that the use of antibiotics in animal production is fueling the increasing problem of transmitting resistance bacteria from food animals to man has led to the search for an alternative to the use of antibiotics. Therefore, the response of broiler chickens fed various medicinal plants methanol extract as a replacement for antibiotics was investigated. The plant extracts encompass four available leaves; Gercinia kola (Bitter Kola), Alchornea cordifolia (Christmas bush), Pterocarpus santalinoides (Red scandal wood) and Chromolera Odorata (Hagony or Siam weed). A total of 180 unsexed Ross strain broiler chickens were randomly assigned to these dietary treatments which had 30 birds each. The treatments were replicated thrice with 10 birds per replicate in a Completely Randomized Design (CRD). Feed and water were provided ad libitum throughout the experiment which lasted for 56 days. Haematological indices of broiler chickens were evaluated. Significant differences (p<0.05) were observed in the mean values of all the hematological parameters measured across the treatment groups, except Packed cell volume and White blood cell. The result values obtained in this present study were within the standard range of PCV of normal birds with the reference range of 25.0 - 45.0%. However, the values obtained did not reveal any health problem. The findings of this study conclude that the medicinal plant methanol extracts have considerable potentials as component of broiler chicken diet. Alchornea cordifolia plant methanol extract can successfully be used to replace antibiotics at 1g/litre of drinking water for broiler production. Further research should be carried out on Alchornea cordifolia and other medicinal plants to examine their potentials and inhibitory characteristics

Impacts of Ebola disease outbreak in West Africa : implications for government and public health preparedness and lessons from COVID-19

There has been an increase in the outbreak of communicable diseases in recent times; the most recent ones are Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) and COVID-19. These diseases have had different impacts on society and the ecosystem. However, underlying these impacts are the levels of preparedness of governments and public health institutions to mitigate and control these diseases. Therefore, this paper aims to explore these impacts, government and institutional interventions and their nexus towards the effective management of such crises. A critical review of empirical literature was adopted for the methodological approach and narrative synthesis used for analysis. Results show that EVD had diverse impacts on West Africa; economically through the loss of income from economic activities due to widespread sickness among workers and movement restrictions. EVD also had significant social impacts, such as reduced community cohesion, school and business closures, job losses, food insecurity, and high morbidity and mortality. Though some good efforts have been made by different countries in collaboration with international organisations like the World Health Organization to control disease outbreaks more effectively, the recent COVID-19 pandemic has however exposed major weaknesses in the capacity of most African countries to cope. Poor capacity for testing and treatment, inadequate health facilities, poor incentives for health care workers, poor governance systems, poor border control, and awareness and research capacities impacted negatively on the capacity to control disease outbreaks. There is, therefore, a need to strengthen health systems across Africa through improved resource mobilisation, staff training, and coordination of investment strategies to sustain health system preparedness to manage future emerging or re-emerging outbreaks

Comparative study on the semen quality characteristics of parthenotes and parent toms reared in Nsukka

The study was conducted to evaluate the semen quality characteristics of turkey parthenotes and parent toms. A total of twenty-four turkeys were  used for the study. These comprised of twelve parthenotes toms and twelve parent toms. Parthenotes are male turkeys produced through parthenogenesis. The toms were subjected to abdominal massage techniques for semen collection. Semen collection was done twice per week and  analyzed for volume, motility, sperm concentration, like sperm, abnormal sperm, normal sperm, dead sperm, total sperm/ejaculates and total  motile sperm cells. The results showed that there were significant differences (p<0.05) in semen volume, sperm concentration, normal sperm cell, abnormal sperm and total motile sperm with mean values being 0.35mL, 1.74x109/mL, 97.80%, 2.20%, 1.68x1012 and 0.41ml, 1.50x109/mL, 94.00%, 6.00% and 1.42x1012, respectively for both parthenotes and parent toms. However, semen parameters such as motility, live sperm cell, dead sperm cell and total sperm/ejaculate showed no significant difference (p>0.05) with values of 96.7%, 97.7%, 2.30% and 6.07x109 for parthenotes toms and  93.20%, 98.50%, 1.50% and 6.23x109 for parent toms. It was observed from the results that turkey parthenotes possess good quality semen characteristic and therefore, recommended for use in poultry industry for turkey production. Keywords: Turkeys, semen quality, parthenotes and parent tom