Diagnosing and Mitigating the Risks of Lambs’ Mortality in the Sheep Farms of Kuwait

Abstract

A survey was carried out to diagnose the rates of mortality of lambs in the sheep farms of Kuwait. The survey results helped determine that the cause of high mortality rate in Kuwait of newborn lambs (≈35%) during the first three weeks of age is the certain infectious diseases affecting the sheep. Following the survey, a field experiment was carried out using a modified vaccination protocol (vaccination during pregnancy) to improve the immune status of the secreted colostrum. This new protocol has improved the immunity of newborn lambs after suckling the hyperimmune colostrum, and reduced mortality rate significantly, compared to the conventional protocol (vaccination before pregnancy). The results have proved the efficiency of the modified vaccination protocol. The experiment concluded that the vaccination during pregnancy has shown great promise to reduce the mortality rate of newborn lambs in sheep farms of Kuwait. Upscaling the tested vaccination protocol may set the scene for the betterment of sheep industry of Kuwait.