Pathological findings of condemned bovine liver specimens and associated economic loss at Nyabugogo abattoir, Kigali, Rwanda

There are no published abattoir bovine hepatic lesion prevalence studies in cattle in Rwanda. This study estimated that 12.3% of the livers (n = 4751) examined at Nyabugogo slaughterhouse in Kigali were condemned. Condemnation prejudiced the nation of 3492.00 kg of meat with attendant economic losses of US$8932.40 during the study period. Risk factors for these lesions were also assessed. Male and female animals from 11 districts were used in this study. Hepatic lesions were higher in females (14.6%; n = 1494) than in males (11.1%; n = 3257). About 78.7% of the condemnations were due to fascioliasis, followed by abscesses (5.7%), hepatitis (5.3%), cirrhosis (4%) and other lesions (6.3%). Female animal livers showed more fascioliasis and abscesses (82.2% and 9.5%) than male animal livers (73.3% and 3.3%). The highest rate of condemnation was observed from Kayonza (40.2%; n = 413) and the least was from Gakenke district (0.9%; n = 1031). Cattle from the Eastern Province showed significantly (P < 0.05) higher prevalence of condemnations (26.8%) than the rest of the provinces. Liver specimens of animals below 3 years and above 6 years of age had a significantly higher (P < 0.05) condemnation rate (14.4%) (n = 3000 and n = 769) than the 3-6 year age-group at 4.1% (n = 982). We conclude that fascioliasis was responsible for a significant proportion of the liver condemnations at Nyabugogo slaughterhouse. Being a zoonosis, we recommend an epidemio-surveillance, implementation of control measures and anthelmintic resistance investigation for fascioliasis in Rwanda.