MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Schmallenberg disease hitting lambs and calves spreads to all England and Wales
A disease that can lead to lambs and calves being stillborn or deformed has spread to every county in England and Wales. Some farmers are expected to lose livestock during the lambing season, which is just getting underway. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesI have no idea what this has to do with Latin America.
Dec 19th, 2012 - 12:23 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Sorry hold, but it does and as a farmer I am worried that it will spread here. The Europeans are very strict about animal health standards in South America but are very sloppy about controlling thier own research stations. This latest disease “escaped” from a research station in Germany. The last outbreak of foot and mouth disease in UK emanated from a research laboratory in Kent. Not to mention the feeding of sheeps brains infected with scrapie to cattle which created BSE and its related human diseases which killed a number of people. Well out here we dont allow those sloppy practices to kill people
Dec 19th, 2012 - 05:43 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Just another day in disease-ridden Europe.
Dec 19th, 2012 - 08:49 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The uk is not Europe..or at least they do not want to be part of the EU.
Dec 20th, 2012 - 02:08 am - Link - Report abuse 0Ah, it's all Europes fault! now there's a suprise!
Dec 20th, 2012 - 08:14 am - Link - Report abuse 0@2 Redpoll, more what I meant was this virus diffusion vector appears to be the midge. Also I am not aware of even a minor trade in live animals between the UK and Latin America it is not clear how it would be able to spread to Latin America in the first place. If I am wrong I would be genuinely interested in know what trade takes place btw a a farmers son. Otherwise I wouldn't get too worried.
Dec 20th, 2012 - 12:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0As for the latter part I have some basic knowledge of bio-security in research facilities and the difficulty of controlling materials (virus, bacterium etc) that you can't easily detect, this means it is not unsurprising that these things eventually happen. The book Normal Accidents by Charles Perrow is a brilliant one for highlighting the fallibility of systems that we assume safe because they are shrouded in the authority of technology and science which created them.
Yes hold I would agree with most of what you posted. Ok the vector may be a midge but that doesnt excuse the research station from releasing the virus, bacteria, prion, call it what you will, in the first place. You are right The livestock trade from Europe to South America is non existent but animal semen is imported and has been prohibited for the possibility that the BSE prion may exist in the semen
Dec 20th, 2012 - 04:44 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The export of live sheep and cattle to Turkey, Jordan and at one time Libia from here is a fact of life
On another tack the present slaughter policy by Defra in case of FMD is just crazy. I remember well the stink of burning carcasses in Cumbria. Nobody ever died from FMD withthe exception of some of my colleagues in Uk who commited suicide. Why the hell dont you just vaccinate against the disease.We do and we get pretty good prices for the beef and lamb on the international markets
The problem is similar to a supposed outbreak of smallpox, now eliminated world wide. If it comes back, compulsory euthanasia for the victims and thier families and the crematoriums would be busy
Sorry to be so negative in this season of goodwill and humanity, but I think Defra policy is wrong. They should address the diseases transmitable to humans like leptosirosis and hydatic cyst, prevalent in some sheepdogs, paticularly in Wales
The slaughter policy of Defra with regards to FMD I believe stems from both the fact that it is incurable in the animals themselves, massively diminishes their animal health and welfare as after the initial infection and sores heal, but the virus lays dormant and can reoccur, alongside reducing their productivity, more so for cows than sheep. It is also highly infectious meaning any new healthy animals brought onto the farm or possibly within proximity to a carrier farm would potentially be infected by the stock of disease within the national herd.
Dec 21st, 2012 - 12:43 pm - Link - Report abuse 0As far as human health, bird flu or pig flu did not exist until recently, due to close working conditions and repeated exposure to these viruses by poultry and pig farm workers, the virus mutated something viruses are prone to do and in the case of pig flu at least became human to human transferable.
As for the massive overkill in the 2001 outbreak, it was due to government not taking the outbreak seriously or instigating the correct preventative measures quickly followed by a massive over reaction due to poor assumptions with regards to how rapidly and far the disease could spread.
As for vaccination, a vaccination only lasts for a certain number of months not years, and only protects against one form of the disease which (common cold for instance) are prone to continual mutation meaning it is by no means a safe guard. Secondly countries designated FMD-free without vaccination have the greatest access to export markets.
With regards to research stations I stand by my last point in that bio-security when dealing with viruses and bacterium is highly difficult and 'leaks' are ultimately inevitable. The problem is as a society we have been lulled into a sense of security that we shouldn't have when it comes to our belief in our ability to handle these things safely.
Phone on hold I would agree with some of your comments. But I still think Defras policy is lunacy
Dec 21st, 2012 - 05:39 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I agree you cant vaccinate against FMD with one vaccination.We do it twice a year and any out of season calves have to be injected at four months of age and its very strictly controlled. Yes I have some reservations as they have eliminated the virus C from the vaccine. Look you the attitude of Defra and the Farmers Union in Uk is just kill anything which is a threat. The controversy about badgers and bovine TB. Instead of murdering them why not just catch them up and give them the Stain 19 vaccination,? Probably there is a more advanced vaccine today. The ones that escape vaccination are going to die of TB anyway and so the remainder is a healthy stock and no threat to the cattle stock. Impossible? No it aint. The repatriation of the hedgehog population from the Hebrides because as an invasive species they were seriously damaging the ecology of those islands is a success story. So Defra needs to think differently
The proliferation of urban foxes is also worrying. It just needs one to get infected with rabies and you will have a major problem in UK
What a shame =(
Dec 24th, 2012 - 04:40 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Commenting for this story is now closed.
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