September 25, 2007

Another British herd positive for FMD

Britain's livestock owners are in for more bad news Monday (September 24) as another cattle herd tested positive for foot-and-mouth disease, and a second cow was found to have bluetongue disease.

The cattle were found in an existing foot-and-mouth control zone of Surrey, southeast of London, and the site became the seventh one where livestock tested positive for the disease in England since last month. The cattle were already slaughtered, confirms the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Previously, four cases of foot-and-mouth had been confirmed in Surrey this month, following two in August that authorities traced to a nearby veterinary laboratory site.

Since the new outbreak of foot and mouth last month, hundreds of animals have been slaughtered and movement of animals has been restricted at one of the busiest times of the year for livestock sales.

Earlier Monday, the environment ministry announced that a second cow had tested positive for bluetongue   disease at a farm in Suffolk in eastern England. It said the cow was on the same farm where the initial case was discovered over the weekend, the first ever found in Britain.

A larger outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in 2001 resulted in thousands of cattle, sheep and pig carcasses being burned on large pyres across the country and the farming industry lost millions in revenue.

Foot-and-mouth disease affects cloven-hoofed animals, including cows, sheep, pigs and goats. It does not infect humans.

Bluetongue is an insect-borne, viral disease once common only in Mediterranean climes. It can be fatal for cows, sheep and other ruminant animals, but does not affect humans.

A bluetongue temporary area for surveillance was being established in a large area north and northeast of London, including Suffolk, Norfolk, Northamptonneshire, Cambridgeshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire.