Vet hospitals to come up in zoos

HYDERABAD: In the wake of the death of a chimpanzee named Mamatha in the Nehru Zoological Park in the city, the Andhra Pradesh Zoo Authority is planning to set up veterinary hospitals with categorised in-patient wards on the zoo premises itself.The plan is not confined to the city zoo but also covers other zoos in the State.Every year, about 60-70 rescued/resident animals and birds die in the zoos in Tirupati, Visakhapatnam and Hyderabad mainly because of lack of proper medicare facilities.“To check mortality rate in zoos, the AP Zoo Authority along with the State Compensatory Afforestation, Management and Planning Authority have recently released `60 lakh to set up well-equipped veterinary hospitals in zoos,” P Mallikarjuna Rao, Director, AP Zoos, told City Express.Construction of vet hospitals has already started in Tirupati and Visakhapatnam zoos.“The hospital work will start in the Hyderabad zoo by the end of this month.We have planned to complete the project by the end of the financial year,” the director said.P Srinivas, veterinary assistant surgeon of the Nehru Zoological Park, said, “the new vet hospitals will have modern equipment like scanners, incubators, blood-analysers, medicine refrigerators and squeeze-cages.” At present, every zoo has one vet doctor and two assistants with limited medical facilities.In the new hospitals, more number of staff will also be recruited depending upon the requirement and medicines will also be stocked up.The inpatient wards in zoos will especially help in taking care of birds.Another reason for setting up hospitals in zoos is that communicable diseases among animals could be detected early and checked.“Our aim in setting up hospitals with categorised wards for animals, birds and reptiles, is to control communicable diseases among animals and birds and provide treatment at the right time ,” the zoos director explained.The zoos in Tirupati, Visakhapatnam and Hyderabad house about 100 species and 3,038 animals and birds.In the past six months, 30 animals have died while being handled by staff in the three zoos.Last year, the number of deaths was 68.The reasons for these deaths range from senility to cage shock.