Local companies to be asked to make foot-and-mouth disease vaccines

South Africa needs about 25-million doses of foot-and-mouth disease vaccines annually. Archive photo: Ihsaan Haffejee

• Private companies are to be asked to make foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) vaccines, agriculture minister Willie Aucamp told Parliament on Tuesday.
• The Agricultural Research Council (ARC) manufactures an FMD vaccine but cannot meet demand.
• Aucamp said 21-million doses have been imported or produced this year, mostly from Turkey and Argentina.

Minister of Agriculture Willie Aucamp announced in Parliament on Tuesday that South African private companies will be asked to make foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) vaccines.

South Africa is in the midst of its biggest ever FMD epidemic. It has cost the cattle industry billions of rands.

The Agricultural Research Council (ARC) manufactures an FMD vaccine. But it cannot meet demand. Aucamp explained that local companies would be asked to manufacture the ARC’s vaccine, under licence from the ARC. He said the ARC board had agreed to this on Monday.

South Africa’s cattle population is about 12 to 14-million. Ideally every animal should be vaccinated twice yearly for FMD. This means about 25-million vaccine doses are needed annually.

Addressing the Portfolio Committee on Agriculture, Aucamp said that 21-million doses have been imported or produced this year, 11.5-million from Turkish company Dollvet and nine-million from Argentinian company Biogénesis Bagó. Over half-a-million have been procured from the Botswana Vaccine Institute. The ARC has produced over half-a-million.

Of these 21-million doses, 19-million have already been distributed, said Aucamp. He said the country’s nearly 1.4-million dairy cows have all been vaccinated at least once. In the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal they have all received booster doses, and about 80% have received the booster shot in the Eastern Cape.

The minister confirmed that the vaccines from Turkey and Argentina cost about R45 each. He did not say how much the ARC is charging for its vaccine.

Debate over profit from vaccine

The minister updated the committee on the suspension of Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) acting CEO Jacob Modumo. His suspension was announced earlier this month. He is accused of allowing OBP to make a profit from the FMD vaccine. (GroundUp understands that the allegation against OBP is that it bought FMD vaccines from Biogénesis at R45 and sold them for between R70 and R130.)

MP Zwelakhe Mthethwa (MK) accused Aucamp of not following the correct process in suspending Modumo and assuming him guilty until proven innocent. He asked why OBP shouldn’t make profits from its vaccine.

Aucamp responded that due process had been followed exactly according to the law in the case of the OBP acting CEO. Two sources had presented him with evidence of Modumo’s actions. He had in turn presented this to the OBP board, which unanimously proceeded with a precautionary suspension.

The minister said that the suspended CEO had failed to provide preliminary reasons why his suspension should not be lifted.

He said that an independent legal firm had been appointed to carry out an investigation and instructed to do so thoroughly and quickly. In the meantime, the company secretary has been appointed acting CEO for two weeks.

Aucamp explained that OBP was not a manufacturer of the FMD vaccine. Previously, when the vaccines were imported, they landed at OR Tambo airport and then were delivered to OBP, which then sent them to state vets across the country. That step was unnecessary and the vaccines are now distributed straight to vets. There was no reason for OBP to be marking up the vaccine. Aucamp strongly implied OBP added no value to the process.

Aucamp said the OBP board had unanimously agreed not to profit from FMD vaccines. The profits that it did make will be paid over to the Department of Agriculture, which will use the money to purchase FMD vaccines.

OBP does manufacture animal vaccines, but not FMD ones. The ARC used to manufacture these until about 2005/6 and then lost its capacity to do so.

Mthethwa railed against private companies making profits from the vaccine and called for action against them too. He alleged that white farmers were benefitting from the vaccine while it was being withheld from farmers of other races.

Aucamp responded that South Africa should be grateful that the Argentinian and Turkish companies had managed to meet the country’s FMD vaccine demands.

Rebutting Mthethwa, he explained that these companies were not making an undue profit from the vaccine, nor were they engaged in price-fixing. He said that all farmers of all races were benefitting from the vaccine and that of the 21-million doses imported, only one-million were being held back by the Department of Agriculture. This stock is needed to be able to respond urgently with a supply of vaccines, within 24 hours, when FMD outbreaks occur.

MP Athol Trollip (ActionSA) raised concerns that the third and fourth quarter reports from OBP indicated that 94% of its sales came from FMD vaccines (GroundUp has not seen these reports and cannot confirm this). He was also concerned about OBP’s capacity to produce enough vaccines for other animal diseases. Aucamp said that he had asked OBP for a list of vaccines they produce to be able to assess whether there was enough capacity to meet the needs of other diseases.

Essential question left unasked

The ARC is responsible for collecting FMD samples from infected animals and testing if the virus has mutated so that it can be determined if vaccines need to be updated. This information has to be shared with vaccine manufacturers, either by the ARC itself or the world reference laboratory for FMD, The Pirbright Institute in the UK. For the latter to occur, the ARC has to provide samples to Pirbright, but it has not done so since January.

Farmers have expressed concern that as a vaccine manufacturer, the ARC has a conflict of interests and may not wish to share data with other vaccine manufacturers. Unfortunately, no MPs in the oversight committee asked the minister about this. (Read more about this.)

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