MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

UK: Foot-and-mouth control zones lifted but relentless vigilance still needed

Temporary control zone lifted - but relentless vigilance still needed

Defra has confirmed that two temporary control zones in Kent and Surrey, set up to prevent the spread of foot and mouth disease, have been lifted.

The decision is based on further negative laboratory results for the disease and supporting veterinary advice. The latest development means that the vaccination teams will be stood down from their current level of alert. But teams could be stood up again in five days if needed, Defra said. Earlier, preliminary tests on a farm in the Romney Marsh area of Kent and on animals at Chessington World of Adventures & Zoo in Surrey proved negative. A 3km temporary control zone had been set up around the Kent farm - the first established outside Surrey where there have been two confirmed cases. Vets were also called to Chessington World of Adventures following a routine check on the park's animals, and a similar restriction was placed around the site, which is outside the original surveillance zone. Dr Debby Reynolds said on Wednesday that the risk of the disease spreading outside the original protection and surveillance zones around the infected farms and Pirbright laboratory in Surrey was now very low. As a result, restrictions on the movement of animals were being eased from midnight last night to allow livestock to be moved around a farm, within a 3km radius, for welfare reasons. This will allow farmers, for example, to move cattle from one field to another, or move them to a shed on a different part of a farm for milking. A ban still remains in place on the movement of animals to market but Dr Reynolds said a special licence would apply to pigs which would allow them to be moved from breeding units to grower units, and from grower units to finishing units over a distance of no more than 50km.