AVSPNI president takes up chain of office

New AVSPNI president Paul Crawford from Islandmagee (RVC graduate 1998) is pictured receiving the Chain of Office from Phil Walsh at the Association of Veterinary Surgeons Practising in Northern Ireland (AVSPNI) at their AGM on the 9th January.

After thanking Phil for all his hard work in the previous year as well as that of the rest of the Council Paul outlined some priority areas for the incoming year as well as the excellent range of CPD events in planning.

There will be a need to continue to try and inject fresh energy and impetus into the drive to eradicate bovine TB. Antimicrobial use patterns are changing and for the positive over the past year but there are areas where further work can still be done to improve the control of supply of, and the need for, antimicrobials by all classes of animal keepers.

A new area for focus this year will be on Sheep Scab which is getting out of control in Northern Ireland and with reports of resistance emerging on the mainland to some of the commonly used treatments a new strategic approach is needed. A meeting will be arranged shortly for the key stakeholders to get together to discuss the issue and to hear of work in other parts of the UK to bring control to this devastating parasite.

An extensive range of CPD events are planned for the incoming year with Conferences in the La Mon (2-4 May), Slieve Russell (27-29 Sept) as well with the Dairy themed Summer meeting and an Autumn meeting with a Cardiology theme.

Full details of all events will be on the VetNI website:www.vetni.co.uk