‘Meat and dairy products from Kouga safe’

Bay report flagging outbreak of diseases in herds outdated, says municipality

Meat and dairy products from the Kouga municipal region are safe to consume.

This was said by Kouga municipal spokesperson LauraLeigh Randall, who has moved to allay fears of an outbreak of infectious bacterial diseases in animal herds in the area affecting meat and dairy products.

She was responding to a report by Nelson Mandela Bay acting executive director of public health Joram Mkosana, who flagged the discovery of diseases affecting animals in the Kouga municipal area.

Mkosana wrote that officials from the Kouga municipality had turned to the Bay for help to test the animals because they did not have the capacity to do so themselves.

“It was noted with concern that there are currently a number of reported emerging and re-emerging zoonotic diseases in the Kouga municipal area, including bovine tuberculosis [and] brucellosis affecting animal herds,” Mkosana wrote.

Zoonotic diseases are infectious diseases caused by bacteria, viruses or parasites that can spread from animals to humans.

However, Randall insisted on Wednesday that the meat and dairy from the region were safe for consumption, adding that the Kouga municipality was not aware of any cases of emerging or re-emerging zoonotic diseases in 2019.

“The last reported case was in 2018 and this was handled with the assistance of the state veterinarian.

“The assistance Kouga requested from the Nelson Mandela Bay metro was for routine inspections,” she said.

Mkosana’s report was tabled at a Bay mayoral committee meeting on Wednesday

— the first time the committee has met since November 6.

It did not specify whether any steps had been taken to stop animal products from the affected herds from entering the Bay.

The report noted that the Bay — and other metropolitan municipalities — was responsible for the implementation of municipal health services in surrounding regions in line with the constitution.

“Kouga local municipality, Ndlambe local municipality, Sundays River local municipality [and] Makana local municipality have a number of farms producing dairy products and meat products which are distributed to various destinations, including the Nelson Mandela Bay area,” it said.

Mkosana said from a human health point of view, milk and meat products from affected herds should not be used for human consumption because of the risk of transmission of zoonotic diseases.

“Such milk or meat should be tested by environmental health practitioners for microbiological and chemical compliance before it is allowed for distribution in the NMBM community.

“The production facilities for diary products should be inspected and certified as provided for under the National Act, 2003 (Act 61 of 2003.”

Mkosana wrote that at a recent meeting, officials from Kouga had indicated that they did not have sufficient capacity to carry out inspections and testing services for the affected products and requested assistance from the metro.

Capacity developmental programmes would be now implemented to ensure that health officials from the surrounding local municipalities were sufficiently capacitated to carry out their own mandate in the future.

Mkosana said discussions between the municipalities resulted in a proposal for a memorandum of understanding to be signed to enable co-operation, which would improve service delivery.

Randall said all animals used for dairy and meat produced in the Kouga region were tested annually for all relevant diseases in line with legal requirements.

“Kouga also has a good working relationship with the state veterinarian, the department of rural development and agrarian reform and the environmental health sections of the Sarah Baartman district municipality and Nelson Mandela Bay metro, which enables us to deal with any potential health risks quickly and effectively,” Randall said.

Responding to the proposal for a memorandum of understanding between the municipalities, the Bay’s acting CFO, Jackson Ngcelwane, wrote that this would result in additional costs being incurred by the metro.

Councillors agreed that the memorandum of understanding be entered into.