Prevention and Cure of Enzootic Muscular Dystrophy in Beef Cattle

Abstract

INVESTIGATIONS carried out in collaboration with the veterinary investigation officers in Scotland have shown that a muscular dystrophy of suckling beef calves is quite commonplace. In Inverness and adjoining counties it appears that the disease occurs on some 15–25 per cent of all farms rearing beef cattle, and that the incidence on these farms may occasionally approach 90 per cent. Studies of the gross and microscopic pathology have shown the disease to be very closely comparable to both experimental vitamin E deficiency¹ and the cod-liver oil toxicity syndrome^2,3 of calves. Furthermore, analyses of the feeding-stuffs making up the winter rations of the cows in these areas indicate that the intake of α-tocopherol is very low⁴. The disease almost invariably occurs in calves born indoors in spring to mothers which have been housed since the previous autumn.