What options are available to treat Mycoplasma bovis?
Treating Mycoplasma bovis is problematic for several reasons. The first issue is that early treatment is essential to any degree of success, but early diagnosis is extremely difficult. Because it is generally a secondary infection, its symptoms can be masked by those of the primary infection. In fact, a Mycoplasma bovis diagnosis isn’t usually made until lab cultures are confirmed — often in a postmortem exam. The next issue is the lack of effective antibiotics. Because the Mycoplasma bovis bacteria lack a cell wall, they are resistant to most antibiotics, which kill bacteria by destroying their cell walls. And evidence is accumulating that strains of Mycoplasma bovis are becoming resistant to the antibiotics traditionally used for their control. Some experts suggest that long-acting oxytetracycline be given three to four times at 72-hour intervals in order to maintain optimum drug levels for 10 to 14 days, though clinical trials have not been done to validate this. Finally, even if an
Cattlenetwork.com Treating Mycoplasma bovis is problematic for several reasons. The first issue is that early treatment is essential to any degree of success, but early diagnosis is extremely difficult. Because it is generally a secondary infection, its symptoms can be masked by those of the primary infection. In fact, a Mycoplasma bovis diagnosis isn’t usually made until lab cultures are confirmed – often in a postmortem exam.
