Tsetse fly traps have been set up along the Kenya-Uganda border to eradicate the pests that cause fatal sleeping sickness.
If untreated, it is almost always fatal because of damage to the central nervous system.
The Kenya Tsetse and Trypanosomiasis [sleeping sickness] Eradication Council (Kenttec) has laid the traps.
The simple biconical-shaped traps include insecticide-impregnated mesh and tsetse fly lures.
Kenttec's Rift Valley coordinator Sylvia Korir said tsetse flies and trypanosomiasis are major constraints to the development of pastoral communities, especially in Turkana.
She said a 2020 report from the Turkana department of Livestock on tsetse infestation prompted a survey.
"We conducted a baseline assessment and found the tsetse and trypanosomiasis a challenge in Turkana South and Turkana West,” Korir said.
A team went to Turkana for a week to lay traps and build capacity of county staff on maintaining them, controlling the flies and spreading awareness.
Korir said the flies are a vector of protozoan parasites that cause trypanosomiasis/nagana disease in livestock. The deadly disease causes huge economic losses and the cost of drugs is high.
She said they have piloted the intervention starting in Turkana West to minimise the burden of the tsetse flies to a level where pastoralists are notaffected.
She said the team has been in Nawontos, Oropoi and Letelej in Turkana West. They set up 200 insecticide-impregnated traps to kill and reduce the number of flies so pastoralists and their animals can be largely free of them.
Korir said they have educated the community about the disease, its cause, treatment and traps.
Twenty representatives were given 20 spray pumps and insecticide to control the flies. Mass spraying should cover more than 10,000 animals.
Turkana director for Veterinary services Benson Long’or thanked Kenttec.
"We are near the tsetse-infested areas of Kenya and Uganda, that’s Kidepo Valley National Park," he said.
"Community disease reporters and local leadership have been reporting cases, so this is timely support."
Long’or said the interventions would reduce mortality rates of livestock that have worsened in the drought.
Turkana is vulnerable to both human and transboundary animal diseases due to its location and three international borders.
(Edited by V. Graham)
