Contagious agalactia of ruminants is an endemic disease caused by
The epizootic situation regarding contagious agalactia was studied during 2011–2021 on sheep farms in the south of the Odesa region in Bessarabia. Over two million blood samples from sheep aged 1–6 years were serologically investigated and the prevalence of agalactia was correlated with Selyaninov’s hydrothermal coefficient for each sampling year.
High rates of infection of sheep with contagious agalactia (from 13.1% to 14.4%) were registered in 2012, 2016 and 2021, years which according to the hydrothermal coefficient of 1.0 were sufficiently moist. The lowest incidence rates, from 6.5% to 7.4%, were registered in the very dry 2013, 2014 and 2019 with hydrothermal coefficients of 0.5‒0.6. In sufficiently moist years, contagious agalactia of sheep manifested itself in the mastitic form, while in the dry period the mastitic form was half as prevalent, and the mixed, articular and ocular forms of the disease proliferated.
The results indicate the circulation of