Development, Production, and Application of Vaccines in Foot-and-Mouth Disease Control in India

Abstract

Foot-and-mouth disease is a crucial animal health hazard, being widespread and endemic in the vast Indian subcontinent, which has a more than 400 million susceptible livestock population. It causes an annual economic loss of many millions of rupees for the country. India may be considered an ideal habitat for the infection to persist, spread, and flourish over centuries with its agroclimatic, socioeconomic conditions. It has mixed farming of different species of livestock, which together provide a conducive ecological milieu for the pathogen. The disease is caused by a single-stranded positive-sense RNA virus of 8 kilobases (kb) length, which itself is a fascinating organism or macromolecule.