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[CLKD]

(Foot and Mouth 1991)     The first case of the disease to be detected was at Cheale Meats abattoir in Little Warley, Essex on 19 February 2001 on pigs from Buckinghamshire and the Isle of Wight.  [It was also found by a skilled Vet in Northampton Markets].

Over the next four days, several more cases were announced in Essex. On 23 February, a case was confirmed in Heddon-on-the-Wall, Northumberland, from where the pig in the first case had come; this farm was later confirmed as the source of the outbreak and the owner, Bobby Waugh of Pallion, was found guilty of having failed to inform the authorities of a notifiable disease and banned from keeping farm animals for 15 years. He was later found guilty of feeding his pigs "untreated waste". [2][3][4]

On 24 February, a case was announced in Highampton in Devon. Later in the week, North Wales was affected. By the beginning of March, the disease had spread to Cornwall, southern Scotland and the Lake District where it took a particularly strong hold.

.  The biggest problem was transportation of slaughtered animals in unsealed vehicles.  The spread could have been contained had carcasses not been moved by road.  I won't go into the mess on the roads  but a lot of that debris ran into water courses etc.. 

[Dorothy]

I've been thinking about those times recently - I lived in a very rural community and my best friends were all farmers.  I can still remember the fear, waking up each morning to see the soaring infection rate, driving up to farm gates with essential food supplies and driving away again, desperately hoping that I hadn't somehow transmitted the infection to those bags of food.  And when animals on one farm were slaughtered for having suspicious signs, that sick feeling as we waited to find out if they tested positive, which would mean all the surrounding farms had to be culled.  And the loneliness, cut off from everyone and everything I cared about.  And when it ended, hoping we would never go through something so bad again.

And now we are.  Only it's a million times worse.  Will we ever learn? 

[CLKD]

Also the Government of the day handled this issue really badly .......

[Dorothy]

It was a total shambles.  And so much animal suffering.  They brought the army in to kill the animals because it was 'quicker' and those guys were just running round firing at random like they were in some kind of video game.  But it was real, and real animals died in agony, while those who could have ended their lives painlessly were forced to stand by.

Certainly doesn't look like the government has learned anything about how to deal with crises from that. 

[sheila99]

You don't have to be very bright to work that if you have an infectious disease in a small  number of animals and do nothing about it you end up with everything getting it. Anyone with animals or children knows it. It happened with FMD then with bovine TB and now with coronavirus. It's infuriating and very sad that everyone knows it except the government. We were lucky we didn't get FMD, it was devastating for those that did.

[CLKD]

How do 3rd World countries cope though  surely they don't cull as we do?

[sheila99]

FMD isn't actually as bad as they make out, many animals recover. You're right they don't cull, the disease is endemic. It seems more to do with politics. We don't import fresh meat from anywhere that isn't FMD free, and there are countries we couldn't export to if we lost our FMD free status.

[Dorothy]

Yes, from a farmer's point of view, it's more that the animals lose condition terribly and take forever to recover - plus it is extremely contagious.  But as @sheila99 says, its mostly political.

[CLKD]

sheila99 -  tnx


CLKD

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_Kingdom_foot-and-mouth_outbreak


They contained this one before it had spread too far.

[CLKD]

tnx for that.  I have spent many an hour during the week wondering whether I was aware at the time  ...... Dad died in 2006 so I was probably involved with sorting mother out  ........ loosely that is. 

[CLKD]

...... means that farmers have no movement restrictions and East Anglia is particularly badly affected.

[CLKD]

So how can a flock in Wales have been diagnosed with Blue Tongue if there are movement restrictions, other than that they were according to media reroots, brought over from E Anglia  .  The incubation period is 5–20 days, and all signs usually develop within a month.


Animal to animal transmission is not reported except through the transplacental route. so why would there be a risk of spread other than the midge going from animal to animal ........ and when would a flock be considered free of disease?

[Kathleen]

Hello ladies.

Everyone who has livestock is aware that Blue Tongue is spread by the BTV virus carried by biting midges. There is no animal to animal transmission except via the placenta and humans cannot be infected.

Take care ladies.

K.

[CLKD]

I can never understand why farmers sell/buy from TB infected areas either.  Surely to stop the risk those farms with badgers should be a closed herd until such time as the government of the day agrees to a vaccination programme?

[sheila99]

Everyone is on standstill for a week after buying something. Unfortunately they haven't imposed the same restriction on midges yet.
  If you buy from a tb free area animals are tested every 4 years so there could be a lot of tb spread before it's found. Everything in a higher risk area has to be tested before it's sold. If you're in a tb free area and buy from a higher risk area it has to tested again after you buy it so most people don't. The main problem is that the test isn't fit for purpose. There are many false positives (when they've murdered the cow they can't culture any tb) so these are probably the ones that have been exposed to it but not caught it - the very ones you want to keep alive. You wouldn't know if some have it but test negative.
  It is very common for badgers causing a nuisance in towns to be dumped anywhere in the countryside and there is no check if they are infected. There isn't an effective vaccine for tb in humans yet and there certainly isn't one for either cattle or badgers. Someone we used to buy calves from in a tb free area was in a trial for badger vaccination. A year later his herd went down with tb. I think male badgers can travel a long way looking for new territory and a mate and if it's infected of course the disease will spread.