The Assessment of Toxoplasmosis in Small Ruminants based on the Animal Health Economics Perspective

Toxoplasmosis is a parasitic and zoonotic disease, with a high prevalence in human and animals around the world. Small ruminants are an important source of toxoplasmosis causing serious health problems in human. The disease brings about important financial losses including production losses and disease control expenditure in small ruminants, together with the losses of labour force, care and treatment cost in human. Considering the declarations of financial losses related to toxoplasmosis, it was observed that the methodology used and data sources were not expressed in a precise and understandable way, the estimations were performed not for the infected cases each but, instead, at sectoral and national level, and these estimations were found to be quite different from each other. In order to obtain reliable results from the analyses of disease, an updated the scientific methodology and reliable data sources are needed to be utilized. In this article, the financial importance of toxoplasmosis on small ruminants and human was emphasized and the disease in small ruminants was considered on the basis of the animal health economics perspective.