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October 21 2005 ~ DEFRA spent nearly 9 million pounds on 3 outside law firms in 2002-2004

Yesterday, Owen Paterson, in deploring the cuts made by DEFRA that threaten, among others, the British beekeepers, mentioned the figure of £8,959,406.49 spent on only three outside law firms between 2002 and September 2004. As Owen Paterson put it, "DEFRA's astonishing annual travel budget of £2,224,000" may also raise eyebrows when one considers the Department's record - But was the figure of nearly £9 million spent on trying to avoid paying the contractors' outstanding invoices from Foot and Mouth - to whom it still owes more than £40 million? (See FPB campaign)

October 7 - 14 2005 ~ "... public concern that new technological advances in vaccine production, diagnostic testing and epidemiology have not been significantly employed."

http://europa.eu.int/comm/food/animal/diseases/strategy/index_en.htm "a new EU animal health strategy is being developed aiming to strengthen the policy of disease prevention, make emergency vaccination a more viable option, simplify the legislation and finance new actions."
"At the initiative of the EU Commission, an animal health "Technology Platform" is being set up, which bring together companies, research institutions, the financial world and the regulatory authorities at the European level to define a common research agenda which should mobilise a critical mass of national and European public and private resources. This project will be industry driven to develop and deliver the most up-to-date tools (e.g. new vaccines or tests) to control animal diseases of major importance to Europe and to the rest of the world."
The final version (August 2005) can be seen here (pdf file in new window)
Extracts
In Europe, control of diseases such as FMD, CSF and Avian Influenza has involved mass slaughter of animals infected with the disease and the precautionary slaughter of those assessed to have been in contact and potentially infected with the same virus. The emergence of these diseases in Europe and Asia has led to the slaughter of millions of animals at high economic cost. This has given rise to public concern that new technological advances in vaccine production, diagnostic testing and epidemiology have not been significantly employed. For ethical, ecological, environmental, social and eco-nomic reasons there is a need for alternative solutions to be found for the control and eradication of epidemic diseases...(1.3) .
....The potential of new advances in vaccine development cannot be fully exploited if there is no public acceptance of the technologies involved. Safety and ethical concerns have to be taken seriously and attempts need to be made to inform and educate the public on the benefits and risks of new technologies. (2.4)"
(read in full)

October 7 - 14 2005 ~ "loss of trust in authority and systems of control"

The report from Lancaster University entitled Psychosocial effects of the 2001 UK foot and mouth disease epidemic in a rural population: qualitative diary based study ( Read the report as a web page ) concludes
"The epidemic was a human tragedy, not just an animal one. Longitudinal ethnographic study shows the profound psychosocial effects of the disaster among a wide range of rural workers and residents that would not be revealed by more traditional biomedical or health research methods...
...We argue for more flexibility in disaster planning and organisational emergency plans (such as less tightly prescribed steps and invariant sequences in planning)..."
The study shows that continuing feelings of bereavement, fear of a new disaster, concern about the undermining of the value of local knowledge, long after the end of the epidemic, still cause distress. It reflects the personal feelings of trauma owing to "chaos, to loss of personal security, and a feeling of powerlessness in the face of conflicting advice".
From the point of view of animal disease control, the "loss of trust in authority and systems of control" expressed by the respondents is perhaps one of the most worrying aspects of the study. An email received on Friday makes a valid point

October 7 - 14 2005 ~ "...her most harrowing piece of research"

Yorkshire Post today, reporting on the Lancaster University report The Health and Social Consequences of the 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease Epidemic (pdf - new window):
"..... Fifty-four people, including farmers, vicars, district nurses and vets, were independently selected for the research carried out by Lancaster University, and funded by £259,000 from the Department of Health.
During 18 months from December 2001, participants wrote more than 3,200 weekly diaries and also gave in-depth interviews and participated in group discussions. An agricultural worker's diary entry said: "Normally you go out on a farm and have a laugh and a joke, you value the stock for them and you do your job professionally. "This was different – this was trying to keep the farmers upright, trying to stop them from bursting into tears, or to control it if they did burst into tears. I had times when I had farmers in tears, vets in tears, and slaughtermen in tears, and that's bloody hard to know what to do."...
.. "The sheer scale of the disaster is greater and wider and involved more people than has previously been understood. "People remain extremely worried that foot and mouth may reappear, and if it does how it will be dealt with." ....
Read in full

October 7 - 14 2005 ~ "The study shows that life after the foot-and-mouth disease epidemic has been accompanied by distress, feelings of bereavement, fear of a new disaster, loss of trust in authority and system of control and by the undermining of the value of local knowledge"

A report by Lancaster University, The Health and Social Consequences of the 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease Epidemic (pdf - new window) , published in the British Medical Journal, gets important coverage by the BBC
"People affected by the foot-and-mouth crisis in 2001 suffered symptoms close to post-traumatic stress disorder for months afterwards... Flashbacks, nightmares, and conflict in communities were among problems found...
....Uncontrollable emotions and increased social isolation were also identified by the Lancaster University Institute for Health Research.
There was evidence in the longer term of anxieties about emissions from disposal sites where animal bodies were burned and buried, as well as confusion, bitterness and increased fear of unemployment. .."
Read in full ( The article also acknowledges that the number of animals killed was greater than the official 6 million.)

October 1 - 7 2005 ~ Defra still has to settle bills worth £20 million in Devon.

The Western Morning News reports on the Ruttles case and quotes Nick Goulding of the FPB "..... "As a result of the precedent set by this court judgment, we will be encouraging several other contractors we have been supporting to pursue Defra for payment, and claim interest at a rate of over 12 per cent for late payment as their statutory right. This will mean Defra having to pay out up to another £40 million plus interest nationally."
The FPB alleges the Government department could be forced to hand over millions of pounds to a long queue of other contractors still waiting to be paid for the disposal of millions of livestock in Britain's foot and mouth epidemic in 2001..." Read in full

October 1 - 7 2005 ~Vaccinated steak and chips, please

An article in today's Times by Magnus Linklater
".... ...There was a time, after the foot-and-mouth outbreak of 2001, when the National Farmers’ Union uttered dire warnings about the problems caused by buying meat from countries that vaccinated their herds. Ben Gill, who was then the President of the NFU, gave warning that vaccinated animals might be potential carriers of the disease .....
It was this implacable objection to immunisation as the alternative to mass slaughter that convinced Tony Blair, when he took over the campaign to eradicate foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), that it was pointless to explore the option of vaccinating sheep and cattle rather than killing them. No evidence was produced to show that vaccinated animals carried the disease, yet some six million animals were culled, at massive cost to the farming industry and British tourism. The final bill has never been fully quantified, not least because the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has tried to conceal the full total of the sums paid out...
Meanwhile, Brazil and Argentina, where animals have traditionally and routinely been vaccinated, have stepped up their exports to Europe. Far from being commercially blighted, their beef industries are thriving....Defra insists that meat is fully inspected at the port of entry, and only imported from FMD-free zones. Controls, however, are only as good as the country that first imported the meat. ...
....We might perhaps be told about the wholesale destruction of the Amazonian rainforest, which is the price being paid so that Brazil can extend its grasslands and cater for the world’s appetite for cheap meat....... ..." .read in full

October 1 - 7 2005 ~ "Six million"? - "We will never know exactly how many were culled but it was many more than the official figure"

Although "six million" now seems the official figure usually quoted in newspaper articles of the number of animals slaughtered in the FMD crisis, Jane Connor, chief economist of the Meat and Livestock Commission, told Craig Robertson of the Sunday Post on 20th January 2002 that
".. a conservative estimate of 1.2 offspring per breeding sheep culled would mean four million lambs were killed but not accounted for.
Lambs "at foot" of sheep marked for slaughter were also killed but the official tally would only record one animal. The same procedure operated for culled cattle.
Similarly, there were 595,000 cattle culled but the official figures don't include the 100,000 calves killed with them or the 50,000 calves close to birth.
The Welfare Disposal Scheme - set up to cull animals that could not be moved because of restrictions accounted for another 1.6 million sheep and lambs, 169,000 cattle and 288,000 pigs. Another half million light lambs were culled because there was no longer a market for them. None of these is included in the Government's total.
Jane Connor says, "We will never know exactly how many were culled but it was many more than the official figure"
A spokesman for DEFRA initially insisted the number of sheep and livestock culled included offspring killed- with them However, after being told that MLC said otherwise, they -checked their figures.
The press officer returned to admit, "I stand corrected on that one. It- -seems it is standard practice - to count ewes and offspring as one animal. Your information is correct."
The final toll was at least -10,849,000 animals killed. ."
Read in full

September 23 2005 ~ If decision makers are influenced too much by Defra's Cost Benefit Analysis, then the rational use of FMD vaccines will be even more jeopardized says Raúl A. Casas

Permission has been received from Raúl A. Casas, the former Director of the Panamerican FMD Center (PANAFTOSA) to copy to warmwell his comments on the CA website FMD forum about the questionable nature of DEFRA's cost benefit analysis on FMD vaccination. (The posting in its entirety follows contributions by Paul Sutmoller and Martin Hugh Jones.)
" I want to emphasize the important difference between the results of computer simulation CBA models and the epidemiological behavior of FMD when potent vaccines are applied with speed and precision, in addition to the immobilization of livestock and temporary suspension of livestock trade. According to the computational models, the effect of vaccines is rather mediocre while in reality the disease, as well as the infection, has been effectively eliminated during the latest epidemic FMD episodes in the countries in South America ...
..... The CBA computer simulation is an important tool, but the results do not fit or reflect extensive field observations."
Read in full here or on the CA website (new window)
Raúl A. Casas concludes, "The International Animal Health Code of the OIE continues to discriminate the application of FMD vaccines by requiring longer waiting periods after vaccination with regard to the use of stamping-out to regain the status of “Free of FMD”. If decision makers are influenced too much by the results of the CBA, then the rational use of FMD vaccines to eliminate the infection would even be more jeopardized."

September 22 2005 ~ " The diagnostic approach has to focus on the presence of virus and no longer on the presence of antibodies"

A perceived (not veterinary) problem during the FMD crisis was that recovered animals - a great many of them who had thrown off FMD with no ill effects - had to be slaughtered together with wholly unaffected fellows because of old trade rules demanding seronegative animals.
Common sense revolts - or should do. Antibodies protect against disease.
With regard to Classical Swine Fever, Martin Beer, Bernd Hoffmann and Klaus Depner of the FLI, Island of Riems, Germany, call for a "paradgm shift" in disease control policy. They suggest in the paper DOES REAL-TIME RT-PCR FOR CSF MARK THE BEGINNING OF A PARADIGM SHIFT IN THE CONTROL OF CSF? that direct detection of actual virus - the presence of CSFV nucleic acid - rather than testing for antibodies could avoid mass culls of uninfected animals.
"Culling of healthy pigs has become an ethical and animal welfare issue and is not tolerated any more..... significant advances in diagnosis and modern vaccines have been made (real-time RT-PCR, DIVA strategy). The foundations for new concepts to control CSF based on novel diagnostic tools and vaccines have been laid..."
The ideas can be seen and discussed on the Coordination Action website (new window) Please add your voice to the debate if you can. After four years of perplexity at the refusal of UK authorities to include rapid diagnosis in Contingency Planning, it is good to see such a paper with such credentials.

September 19/20 2005~ Lord Whitty hinted at criminal fraud and called Defra's prevarication "safeguarding the public purse"; DEFRA now faces a £40 million late payment bill over foot and mouth

www.fpb.org press release:
".... DEFRA will have to pay Ruttles over £1 million for the cost of the lengthy court hearing in London. This case was only the tip of the iceberg.....
"As a result of the precedent set by this court judgement, we will be encouraging several other contractors we have been supporting to pursue DEFRA for payment , and claim interest at a rate of over 12% for late payment as their statutory right. This will mean DEFRA having to pay out up to another £40 million plus interest."
More than 1,200 contractors were used by Defra during the 2001 crisis.(See warmwell page on the claims)
In January 2004, Lord Whitty, trying to put a bold face on the situation, said
" there are queries about many invoices...some of which appear to represent serious overcharging of one form or another -- whether or not they amount to criminal fraud... "
In the same exchange he had to admit that " Legal costs covering the whole matter, which includes some of the cases in dispute, amount to about £20 million" but he stoutly proclaimed that
"None of the delay is due to ineptness, it is due to the Government -- Defra in particular -- safeguarding the public purse."

September 18 2005 ~ DEFRA "officials had repeatedly lied about what happened in 2001; that their own systems and paperwork were chaotic or non-existent.....": Mr Justice Thornton

Christopher Booker's Notebook today in the Sunday Telegraph once again turns the spotlight on DEFRA's "dishonesty and incompetence" For those of us who fear DEFRA's methods but also fear the connivance of others who would prefer the Department's gross negligence to remain a secret, the High Court ruling on the Ruttles claim a year ago has only now - a whole year later -come to light.
".... For Defra it was a shattering defeat. Yet all the parties involved were ordered to keep silent about the case until the judgment was posted on the Lord Chancellor's website. Although this remains unposted, permission has now been given by Court Services to report it.
As the Ruttles case confirms, Defra officials - presumably on ministerial instructions - used every possible ruse to avoid paying the contractors, accusing them of fraud, questioning every invoice, even for as little as 35p, and enmeshing them in thousands of hours of paperwork.
Mr Justice Thornton's judgment in the Ruttles case - as when he had previously found in favour of another firm, JDM Accord - was excoriating. He dismissed Defra's allegations of fraud out of hand. He found that its officials had repeatedly lied about what happened in 2001; that their own systems and paperwork were chaotic or non-existent; and that their claims to have investigated the case internally were largely fraudulent. On 26 points he found that Defra was in breach of contract ..."
Read in full

September 12 2005 ~ "The policy was not, as stated at the time, "the only option for controlling the current British epidemic"...."

A letter this week in the New Scientist refutes an editorial which stated that "lack of foresight left the government with only one option, the dreadful slaughter of 6 million animals".
".....The "one option" to which you refer was the product of mathematical modelling during the epidemic, and this was indeed an untested and "ad hoc" approach. It is ironic that it was this very process that resulted in much of the extensive slaughter by instigating the automatic pre-emptive culling of all susceptible livestock on contiguous premises (farms neighbouring infected farms).
Subsequent published analyses of data from the epidemic have shown that this policy was not, as stated at the time, "the only option for controlling the current British epidemic". Indeed, these analyses have vindicated the traditional policies and also demonstrated that the peak of the epidemic had passed before the extensive contiguous culling policies could have taken effect....." Read in full
The letter's authors, an impressive list, can be assumed to know what they are talking about.
( It is interesting that the arbitrary number of "six million" is still bandied about when the number of unfortunate animals who were slaughtered in 2001, as pointed out by the Telegraph in January 2002, certainly exceeds 10 million.

September 11 2005 ~ "the 1st vaccine arrived in the region after the disease had already broken out."

ProMed reports on FMD in Russia, where on friday a " total of 33 new cases of foot and mouth disease [FMD] have been registered in the Russian Far East in the past 24 hours." The news report from Tass says,
".......lawmakers said "the slow reaction of corresponding federal structures and complete ignorance of the alarming signs from the region by certain officials in the center had serious consequences".
The main problem was the delayed delivery of the vaccine against FMD. During the June 2005 outbreak of the disease in neighboring Amur region, Primorye authorities requested the Agriculture ministry to supply the necessary vaccine. However, the 1st vaccine arrived in the region when the disease had already broken out.."
The ProMed moderator "AS" remarks, "Since the 3rd week of August, FMD -- caused by serotype Asia 1 -- spread into 2 previously unaffected regions along the Chinese border, namely the Khabarovsk and Primorsk regions. Contrary to the requirements of the International Animal Health Code, no notification of these outbreaks has been forthcoming from the Russian authorities. Their last follow-up report was sent on 30 Jun 2005; it related to a previous outbreak, in the Amur region, more than 1000 km northwest of the current outbreaks."

September 9 2005 ~ £154,678 spent on Cost Benefit Analysis - but we are no nearer a disease control policy that inspires confidence.

In January 2004, James Irvine at Land Care org.uk said, , "DEFRA itself should be familiar with the costs of different strategies.... Is it really an appropriate use of public money?"
A glance at DEFRA's Science and Research Projects shows that the sum was £154,678.00. The report did not propose any single strategy for dealing with a future outbreak. Private Eye's Muckspreader suggested that the exercise could easily be worked out on the back of an envelope.
Meanwhile, as the Animal Health Resources response to the Consultation made clear, there have been "many separate, uncoordinated consultation meetings ...".
The expensive CBA seems to have muddied the waters still further for DEFRA rather than clarified the situation with common sense conclusions. There is no independent Expert group to give genuinely informed advice as required by the Directive.
The Minister is to have a legal "duty" to slaughter animals on premises labelled "infected" - but we do not know if they are to be so labelled by the notorious 2001 method of mere clinical examination rather than proper diagnosis. DEFRA continues to ignore the latest in rapid on-site diagnostics or even mention it in contingency plans.
We do not yet have any definition of "dangerous contacts."
Hardly surprising then that trust in the Department and its contingency plans, for which this expensive CBA was to have been such a valuable resource, is depressingly low.

September 8 2005 ~ dysfunctional government agencies

An editorial in Nature today on the fallout from Katrina, speaks of " the habitual creation of dysfunctional government agencies by congressional fiat; and the failure of scientists to successfully convey their concerns to policy-makers..... "
" ..... ... the disaster should lead to an immediate re-examination of how the federal government is organized, and how it responds to scientific advice...
.....Knowledge of the risk of a storm-induced flood in New Orleans has been widespread in the scientific community for years, and researchers have sought to improve our understanding of it. Much of this work has taken into account stubborn facts such as the propensity of the poor, the elderly and the sick to ignore evacuation orders.
There seems to be a disconnect, however, between the process that identifies such risks and the people who make the decisions that might manage them ..." (More)

September 4 2005 ~ "..other objectives should never override the welfare of livestock, which are sentient beings, not just cheap lawnmowers. "

An article written by an Oxfordshire sheep farmer about the effects of the ESA on animal welfare:
Extracts:
"British Agriculture seems to be entering an increasingly unnatural regime. As financial support from the public purse has more strings attached, the people pulling the strings are further removed from agriculture. ...
.......... It quickly emerged that this regime would not satisfy the nutritional requirements of a modern ewe with lambs. ......
.........The greatest difficulty in arable reversion was to promote biodiversity without encouraging thistles, ragwort or other undesirables. The ESA failed spectacularly..... ..
... the increased costs of combining conservation with farming stretches resources to the limit. .....
.........Sheep have created much of the landscape people love and the optimum level of grazing is the only way to preserve the landscape but other objectives should never override the welfare of livestock......The management of sheep must remain the domain of shepherds, not academics, bureaucrats or the pantheon of non-farming experts taking an interest in the countryside."Read in full
The farmer's clear explanation of how the ESA has "spectacularly failed" in its apparent objectives echoes what seems to us to be happening also in the field of animal disease control. In both, the people "pulling the strings" seem strangely removed from the reality of living, breathing farm animals, from the land itself, and from the people whose skill cares for both.

September 2 2005 ~ "... disease control should be a cooperative effort between government and the livestock sector... major efforts are needed to enhance communication and increase trust. ."

Comments from Animal Health Resources Ltd to Defra’s Consultation on the Transposition of the FMD Directive. For clear reasons set out in their response they ask for an extension to the deadline for responses
" . ..there appears to be many separate, uncoordinated consultation meetings .... Defra appears to place most weight on consultations with “key stakeholders” (Defra’s terminology). While this sector is certainly important, there is some danger in excluding from the consultation process other sectors, including small and family farms, that play a role in disease control but have no coordinated, funded means of communicating with government...."
Read in full

September 2 2005 ~ " we need confidence that the best tools will be used to identify and confirm the disease,....and the best strategy will be implemented, based on the advice of the permanently operational, balanced, Expert Group...."

The response paper above includes the following points - but it deserves to be read in full.
• None of the new proposals contain anything which would increase our capability to protect from and respond to the introduction of FMD or any serious animal disease...
• still no recognition of the role, or acceptance of, new diagnostic tools which can provide rapid identification of disease on site.
• still no mention of enhanced surveillance at entry points
• diagnostic tools such as RRT-PCR (real-time RT-PCR) which can identify infection in less than 3 hours....should be written into the contingency plans, practiced in emergency exercises and implemented.
• The current government approach to cost sharing with regard to disease control and other farming regulations does not encourage local production of food.
• we need confidence that (a) the best tools will be used to identify and confirm the disease, and to inform the control measures (including movement restrictions and vaccination strategies) that will be taken and (b) the best strategy will be implemented, based on the advice of the permanently operational, balanced, Expert Group....
• Infected Premises: How will Defra decide which premises are infected - by proximity? proof by PCR? culture at Pirbright?
• “Dangerous contact”: How is a “dangerous contact” defined?
• Decision to slaughter / decision to vaccinate: What animals would be slaughtered / vaccinated? On what basis would these decisions be taken? ...
• ... proposed changes have been rapidly and quietly instituted ...
  
We believe that the consultation process has been inadequate, and that if the proposals are changed to take account of the points raised, we would all be better prepared for the next animal disease threat."

September 1 2005 ~ EU gives 4.5 million euros to FAO to fight FMD

The European Commission will give euro 4.5 million to the FAO European Commission for the Control of FMD (EUFMD). An agreement between the EC and FAO was signed today. Keith Sumption is quoted in the press release
"The EC funding will enable us to improve FMD surveillance and control activities in countries that continue to pose a risk to Europe, mainly by strengthening their veterinary services. The lack of transparency and reliable information on the occurrence and scale of epidemics in some high-risk areas and the lack of reporting to international agencies like FAO and the World Animal Health Organization is still often of major concern.
In case of an FMD emergency, a rapid response is crucial for the success of any control measures. With the new EC funds, FAO will now be able to send FMD experts to affected countries within 24 hours to analyse the situation to provide technical support and assist in mobilising additional emergency resources.
The EUFMD has 33 member countries. Its budget amounted to around euro 2 million in 2004. Read in full

Aug/September 2005 "...battling against over-whelming odds. .."

Hilary Peters, writes to warmwell this morning:
".... I went from one organic and/or animal friendly farm to the next and met good people struggling hard to make the world a better place. They are still there, but seen from here, I realise they are battling against over-whelming odds.
The VAST majority( ie of large-scale farmers) are in it for a quick profit, have no idea that they are destroying the planet, have no feeling for animals or the land, no notion that they are controlled ....
And I have absolutely no idea how to say this in a way that people will take in."
The food writer, TV chef and countryman Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has said that
".. the Government’s appalling and callous handling of the Foot and Mouth crisis undermined all the fundamentals of good farming and good husbandry....a warning, nationally and even globally... man’s chilling disassociation from the species that feed him....”
Dr Colin Fink, writing in the Spring of 2001 about the UK's policy, in a letter that is just one of the many important documents about the disastrous handling of FMD in the UK:
".... a catastrophic loss of opportunity to gain basic knowledge and is entirely consistent with their retained medieval approach to the whole problem."
Dr Fink mentions his colleague, Professor Fred Brown, who said sadly at the time," it is an unacceptable loss of animals without justification"..."
Over the course of the next few months, a selection of the most important scientific, veterinary, political and witness statements from the huge warmwell archives will be gathered together. This is something of a mammoth task and therefore the updating of this page of the website may not be able to continue for the time being. The archives in full (see also below) will, of course, remain on the internet and can continue to be easily searched using the Google Advanced Search engine for warmwell.com - or similar.

·

August 26 2005 ~ NFU Wales warns against vaccination in its response to the FMD consultation.

According to icwales, the Welsh NFU, in its response to FMD consultation, says that vaccinating animals in another foot-and-mouth outbreak could "financially cripple Welsh livestock farmers."
"NFU Cymru, in its response to consultations on the directive, says vaccination would not only add costs to livestock production, it would leave mountains of unsold meat......"
Emotive language. One wonders if the NFU Wales leadership has understood the hard won derogations, the fact that vaccinated meat does not need to be labelled and what would actually happen in an epidemic if vaccination was once again to be ignored.
We have now been informed that the icwales article follows the report in Farmers Weekly yesterday:
".... Its first concern was that meat from vaccinated animals would not be able to go into the food chain unless it was heat treated, deboned and matured.
NFU Cymru said it had grave doubts as to whether there would be sufficient capacity in Wales to do this..... the market price of vaccinated meat was likely to be heavily discounted.
Another concern raised was that new directive also bans the collection and transportation of milk for sampling for milk hygiene purposes in laboratories not authorised to test for F&M. ....practical problems for those companies located in Wales where there are currently no such laboratories."
Gary in the US fears that a , "... most "natural" reaction on the part of the American Public is: "Well, if it's there on the web like this, it means we can't vaccinate for FMD." To tell you this is sad in itself. We've all worked so hard to attempt to overcome the insanity of these old carry-over FMD policies from days-gone-by."

August 25 2005 ~ A reminder of the way effective technologies to fight FMD have been blocked

The paper U.S. Agricultural and Food Security: Who Will Provide the Leadership? mentions new technologies started fifteen years ago. (our own emphasis)
• " From the mid-1990s, diagnostics were moved from performance in a high-containment laboratory to portable, on-site devices that did not require biological containment." Comment
• A test to discriminate animals that have been vaccinated against FMD from those that have recovered from infection .... APHIS did not pursue the regulatory procedures necessary for validation
• An antiviral drug that would block FMD virus infection.... stopped after early success for lack of funds.
• vaccines that can be manufactured in the U.S... for diseases that are both natural and biological weapons threats. ..... begun in the early 1990s but stopped after early success for lack of funds.
The authors said, "vigorous efforts were made to replace the BSL 3 facilities at Plum Island NY, Athens GA, and Ames, IA, and to provide the first BSL 4 facilities for livestock at Plum Island. We came very close – but suffice it to say that after 6 years of effort there are no modern BSL 3 facilities for agriculture and the nation still has no BSL 4 facility in which to prepare for such dangerous livestock infections as Hendra and Nipah viruses and their cousins yet unknown."
However, see below..

August 25 2005 ~Homeland Security wants to turn Plum Island into "a new, massive center for biological and agricultural defense" with the highest laboratory security level, BSL 4 .

The US GovExec.com's "Daily Briefing" yesterday says that the Homeland Security department announced in a press release on Monday that the US is considering upgrading Plum Island to Biosafety containment level 4 (BSL4) that the new facility would "replace" the "important but aging" more than 50-year-old centre.
Plum Island is still at present a Biosafety Level 3 facility and is still the only facility in the United States where official testing for FMD is allowed. According to the briefing, attempts in the past to upgrade Plum Island have "faced local protests and opposition ..." Read the "Daily Briefing" in full
Plum Island has had security lapses in the recent past, and it has been upgrading its security .
( Warmwell can only report on what it finds. Being itself unvalidated, it is never officially informed of anything. Nevertheless, appalled by the incompetent and bloody fiasco of 2001, warmwell has battled on regardless and unfunded for four years. Perhaps there is now some room for hope if threats of natural incursions of disease or bio-terrorism are now being taken so very much more seriously in the US. Modern technological breakthroughs, still astonishingly unvalidated may at last be going to be used officially. And if the US leads the way, is it then possible that our own contingency plans will start to acknowledge what has in fact been possible for the past decade in the way of vaccine, discriminatory tests, and rapid on-site diagnosis? )

August 25 2005 ~ ProMed reports on FMD in Russia "2 FMD serotypes are, reportedly, evolving now in eastern Asia/the far east:

type Asia 1 in Russia's Amur region (Khabarovsk province); type A in eastern Mongolia's Dornod province. They are more than 1000 miles apart; both share borders with the People's Republic of China". ProMed's report includes news from a Russian source that in the Khabarovsk region "....all measures have been taken to isolate the herd infected with FMD. Mass vaccination of livestock in the Bikinsk district has been underway since 23 Aug 2005. 30 000 additional doses of vaccine are to be delivered over the next few days, and 120 000 doses will eventually be necessary. The decision on stamping out the infected herd has not yet been made."

August 23 2005 ~ Western Morning News on the change of wording from discretion to duty

The WMN's headline is "MINISTERS WILL HAVE A 'DUTY' TO CULL ANIMALS", written by David Wilcock, doesn't really echo what our own concern about the proposed change of wording has been. A DEFRA spokesman quoted in the article has given more clarification than we have seen anywhere else - and we wonder why they could not have made this clear in the first place:
"This does not apply to premises where disease has not been confirmed, where we would retain full discretion to cull or vaccinate as is justified by the scientific and veterinary risk of disease spread. There are also a number of special exemptions to compulsory slaughter on infected premises, where we would retain the discretion to slaughter."
(Read WMN article. In it, John Daw, chairman of the South West regional dairy board, is outspoken about Defra consultations. )

August 23 2005 ~ UK law has always allowed for the slaughter of actually infected animals and no one really argues against this.

However, what is worrying about the WMN article today is that farmers' leaders quoted do not, in their enthusiasm for the cull, acknowledge that healthy animals and pets were compulsorily and illegally slaughtered in 2001 and that for those affected, terrible memories are not easily erased.
If changing the wording from discretion to duty were legally to allow for slaughter on uninfected farms or to absolve the Minister from accountability for exceeding what is allowed in the EU Directive, then our worry about this minor technical amendment continues.
The infamous illegal "contiguous cull" of 2001 was a practice condoned by the leading farmers' unions at the time. A few determined farmers such as Guy Thomas Everard successfully fought Government attempts to cull his herd of 980 pedigree cattle, and Rosemary Upton successfully fought the illegal cull in the courts - much to Maff/Defra's fury- but most farmers were pressured or convinced into giving up their uninfected animals. Such documents as Chris Chapman's new book , the devastating evidence from Knowstone given to the EU Inquiry, the voices of ordinary people as in Fields of Fire, the report of the Devon Inquiry, the Cardiff university paper, Carnage by Computer, and the latest research done on the contiguous cull- and much more - all show that this disgraceful episode must never be allowed to happen again. The law was subsequently changed to give retrospective legality to the contiguous cull.

To find from the WMN article that there are farmers' leaders who seem still to believe that widespread slaughter was justified - and that the only thing that matters to farmers is compensation - is disheartening in the extreme. Many of the arguments, easily discredited, made by the NFU at the time, still seem to carry weight.
If farmers leaders themselves are ignorant about vaccination, rapid diagnosis and the acceptability of vaccinated food products, what hope is there, by September 1, for putting pressure on DEFRA to ensure that national adjustments to the EU Directive are sensible, ethical and scientifically sound? (Read WMN article)

August 20 2005 ~ Defra proposes changes to the FMD Directive

The excellent CA website on foot and mouth and CSF has highlighted concerns about lack of information to stakeholders who, by September 1 2005, are expected to be able to send comments to Defra on the transposition of the FMD Directive - changes that will affect all aspects of FMD disease control. One of the concerns mentioned is that highlighted by warmwell in the middle of June. Our most recent comments about this are now on the CA foot and mouth forum.
Extract: As for the semantic change from 'discretion' to 'duty', I think it is significant. It's also worrying that the phrase "including on infected premises" has been stressed. As you say, to what extent will this duty to slaughter be applied to non-infected premises?.....
"Dangerous contact" has still not been properly defined. Is a "duty" to slaughter to be applied to any animal to fall within this woolly category?.....
legal back-covering. ... If the phrase is "discretion" then the Minister must justify his decision - something this government does not much like being made to do. But "duty" implies that he or she has no choice and can't be held accountable.
This point has, of course, been termed a "minor amendment" but one wonders how a minor change of wording provides the "necessary powers" needed by the Secretary of State if an obligation to slaughter - within clearly defined limits - is already laid down in the EU Directive.
(The CA forum pages (new window), will be monitored by the OIE and FAO. In the interests of openness and transparency, it would be useful if comments sent to DEFRA about the transposition could be copied to the CA website for us all to see.)

August 20 2005 ~ "more than sombre stories of horrendous killing and heartbreak..."

"Silence at Ramscliffe" (see below) has been reviewed by Independent Farm Business News (IFBN). Extract:
"The horror of foot and mouth disease in the Spring of 2001 has scarcely faded in the minds of any of the farmers and workers whom it affected – but how long does it take for 'government', politicians and 'the public' to forget what happens if vigilance of disease observation and control is allowed to become negligent?....
The book contains more than sombre stories of horrendous killing and heartbreak. Towards the end, various kinds of analysis are included, factual, objective and subjective conclusions are reached, references quoted and historical connections made. It's one of those books that brings the whole thing back to life – and should be kept in every college and public library......it should be drawn to the attention of politicians and accountants..."
The book costs £25, and its ISBN is 0-9548683-3-1. It includes a DVD of the same name, courtesy of ITV West. See also full press release

August 18 2005 ~" a warning, nationally and even globally, of how man’s chilling disassociation from the species that feed him is, frighteningly, almost complete "

"Silence at Ramscliffe: Foot and Mouth in Devon" will be launched at the Chagford Show, Devon, today, Thursday 18th August from 10 am.
James Crowden, poet and co-author :
“Nothing prepared me for foot and mouth. Image and reality became inextricably linked. There is no tradition of rural poetry to encompass what we saw,” he said. “The only conscious links were to the First World War and the poetry of Wilfred Owen.”

Zac Goldsmith, editor of the Ecologist said:
“This book provides not only a permanent reminder of the pain inflicted on Britain’s rural communities, but a valuable lesson too – that the nightmare need never be repeated.”

Food writer, TV chef and countryman Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall described the book as a suitably provocative collection of words and pictures.
“Silence at Ramscliffe reminds us just how the Government’s appalling and callous handling of the Foot and Mouth crisis undermined all the fundamentals of good farming and good husbandry,” he said. “It serves as a brilliant warning, nationally and even globally, of how man’s chilling disassociation from the species that feed him is, frighteningly, almost complete.”
See full press release

August 18 2005 ~ BSE vertical transmission in sheep? "....extremely unscientific conclusion"

See reports. Both James Meikle's Guardian report and the New Scientist report said, in what we consider to be misleading and mischievous language, "BSE has been transmitted naturally between sheep for the first time"
There is nothing natural about force feeding infected brain material to ewes, nor is it entirely clear how the lambs succumbed. As Mark Purdey commented in an email this morning: "...everyone knows that you can transmit BSE and other TSEs into as many animals as you want with almost 100% success - but only in the experimental context, where high doses of BSE brain homogenate have been used as the inoculum (the rogue metal microcrystals are the transmissible agents ).
It is extremely unscientific to jump to the conclusion that this is happening in the natural environment, particularly when no sheep have been diagnosed with clinical BSE to date, despite the rigorous post mortem TSE surveillance that has been in place in the UK." Read Mark Purdey's email in full

August 17 2005 ~ lambs at a government experimental station appear to have caught BSE from their mothers.

They were "experimentally fed with 5mg of BSE-infected material" and had lambs that died of BSE after showing signs of infection in their tonsils, 546 days after birth. James Meikle's Guardian report says
"Their mothers had shown no outward signs of the disease at lambing, one showing them 73 days after lambing, and the other 198 days after.... it is still not certain that the lambs were infected while in the uterus, or shortly before or after lambing. The disease may have spread through the birthing fluids or in some other way. The evidence so far suggests this is far more likely than the lambs catching the disease from other apparently unaffected sheep."
So - much uncertainty. But this experiment will no doubt be seized upon as part of the evidence that has been sought now for several years, and it brings the possible end of sheep farming in the UK a little closer.

August 15 - 22 2005 ~ "..significant benefits by fostering information exchange and shared use of resources...by both animal and human health scientists"

New Zealand's National Centre of Biosecurity and Infectious Disease at Wallaceville will open within 18 months. It will be shared by both animal and human health scientists.
Scoop NZ quotes a parliamentary speech given at the launch. Extracts:
".....We think New Zealand will benefit from a closer working relationship between scientists, researchers, epidemiologists, and laboratory staff in animal and human health fields. .....
It will cluster multi-disciplinary skills including microbiology, virology, epidemiology, incident response, disease modelling, and forecasting. Overseas research indicates that such clustering can produce significant benefits by fostering information exchange and shared use of resources... ..."
This echoes what has been said by the virologist, Dr Ruth Watkins " I find the strategies for health of humans in our society, modern Britain, have been neglected or disregarded by the veterinary establishment for farm animals - BSE was the start of the consequences of so doing.."
As for the dangers of illegal imports, the New Zealand Government appears to be taking both biosecurity and protecting its own agriculture very much more seriously than we do;
".. Government has done all it can to ensure that our environment and farming businesses are protected from pests and diseases. However, we're not complacent about our border control measures. We continually review our systems..."
"Not complacent" - but already in New Zealand instant fines for biosecurity breaches have been introduced, there is 100 per cent screening of all air crew and passengers, soft-tissue x-rays and detector dogs operate at all international airports, and a sea container screening programme has been put in place.

August 15 - 22 2005 ~"....Vaccination ..... its implications are now seen as practical ones..."

Defra's new page: "Stakeholder Engagement on FMD Control Strategies" has links to more detail and an Action Plan for meat treatments and processing. That "there should be no price differentials at the point of sale for products from vaccinated and non-vaccinated animals as the differences will not be identified..." is at last clearly and unequivocably acknowledged. Yet more modelling work on "a range of disease scenarios" has been commissioned from Risk Solutions, based on the FMD Cost Benefit Analysis. Read in full What seems so sad about all this is that what is being done now was just as possible before 2001. The arguments against vaccination that convinced many in the meat and retail industry were misguided or worse. But at least proper and practical preparations for this aspect of planning are now underway, as is an attempt to communicate the options more clearly. There are some at DEFRA who really are to be congratulated for this. So are some stakeholders, whose grasp of the realities and whose determined, gradual moving of mountains have begun to make a difference. It is a small but not insignificant step.

August 15 - 22 2005 ~" a warning, nationally and even globally, of how man’s chilling disassociation from the species that feed him is, frighteningly, almost complete "

"Silence at Ramscliffe: Foot and Mouth in Devon" will be launched at the Chagford Show, Devon on Thursday 18th August from 10 am.
James Crowden, poet and co-author :
“Nothing prepared me for foot and mouth. Image and reality became inextricably linked. There is no tradition of rural poetry to encompass what we saw,” he said. “The only conscious links were to the First World War and the poetry of Wilfred Owen.”

Zac Goldsmith, editor of the Ecologist said:
“This book provides not only a permanent reminder of the pain inflicted on Britain’s rural communities, but a valuable lesson too – that the nightmare need never be repeated.”

Food writer, TV chef and countryman Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall described the book as a suitably provocative collection of words and pictures.
“Silence at Ramscliffe reminds us just how the Government’s appalling and callous handling of the Foot and Mouth crisis undermined all the fundamentals of good farming and good husbandry,” he said. “It serves as a brilliant warning, nationally and even globally, of how man’s chilling disassociation from the species that feed him is, frighteningly, almost complete.”
See full press release

August 15 - 22 2005 ~ ".... changing requirements for detection and identification, and input of cutting-edge science .."

The BBC reported again on Saturday the study to be led by Dr Abigail Woods into the history of infectious diseases. (see below) Professor Michael Worboys is quoted: "Our study will review the evolving risk of diseases, changing requirements for detection and identification, and input of cutting-edge science." ( see also University of Manchester press release.)
The input of the cutting edge of science into national policy for animal disease control seems balked by constant and depressing repetitions of "not until it is validated."
Validation? Lack of "validation" doesn't alter the existing usefulness of technologies already widely deployed elsewhere where urgency is acknowledged. It is the willingness to validate that has been lacking and the issue used as an excuse for DEFRA to sit on its hands. It is incomprehensible.

August 15 - 22 2005 ~ Consultation on what should constitute national discretion in the Foot and Mouth Directive ends in only a fortnight

- i.e. by September 1 2005 - but there are questions yet to be answered - questions about the new technologies, the actual make-up of the Expert Group, why and how a "minor amendment" changing the phrase discretion to slaughter into duty to slaughter is necessary to give "necessary powers" to the Secretary of State. Other practical matters remain unresolved.
There are 25 (sic twenty five) DEFRA consultations currently taking place. The presumption that all the stakeholders affected by legislation are first going to assimilate and then respond to consultation documents is unrealistic. Yet the practice of "consultation" is used to justify top-down decisions.
If only the Ministry were trusted to know its facts, seen to be being advised by disinterested experts and known to be communicating fairly and clearly with stakeholders. There would then be no need for such window-dressing. Public servants would be assumed to be just that. As it is, accountability, transparency and a willingness to share the information that is driving policy all seem as far away as ever and, except in the special interest groups, there is an apathy about responding to consultations that seems to us to be wholly understandable.

August 8 - 14 2005 ~ Rapid PCR "... same old leopard, same old spots.."

The FMD forum pages of the Coordination Action website are very interesting. On Friday, in response to Roger Breeze's paper Disease control: Ideas for cost sharing between industry and government "Matthew" disagrees sadly with the optimism I had tentatively expressed. He writes mainly about bovine TB and the government's whole attitude to agriculture, but on the subject of innovative technologies, he says:
"The use of PCR in disease surveillance or diagnosis is well advanced in other countries, and UK medicine is now putting its collective toe into the water in hospitals, but mention its use to Defra - and the reply is luddite and negative. VLA still seem to prefer to 'research' the theory rather than test the reality...."
His post concludes "....I too had thought I detected a 'sea change' in attitude from Defra, but is a leopard spotty? After last week, it's the same old leopard, same old spots. "
It would be so refreshing if DEFRA could prove him - and the major part of warmwell - wrong and show that it has indeed changed its spots. Or at least one or two of them. (One does not need to register in order to read the posts on the CA forum.)

August 8 - 14 2005 ~ A sea change? The CVO thanked all Stakeholders present for having taken the time and trouble "..to attend and participate in this process - defined for the future as a partnership..."

Warmwell's reaction to a stakeholder's report of the recent meeting at DEFRA with the CVO, Debby Reynolds, is that real change could be in the air. There seems to be a shift
• in terms of communication and management skills
  "....Confirmation that this was more than a window-dressing exercise was apparent before the meeting-room door had fully swung open – large and readable name cards demonstrated where DEFRA personnel and the Chair were to sit (precluding the need for a guessing-game and last minute rush to change seats in order to hear).."
• In the genuine gesture towards openness and transparency..
  "...The Agenda and papers will go on DEFRA’s website, where others unable to attend can view and contribute..."
• and in some of the points raised..
  (example) ".... Prior to the meeting Chris (Sheep Veterinary Society lead vet, practicing sheep keeper from the Shropshire / Cheshire border, independent consultant, former SVS employee and a key man at the ministry in 2001), mentioned that at a meeting two days previously DEFRA had agreed never again to initiate what he was referring to as the ‘ Welshpool shambles’. In other words, Contiguous and DC culling would never be initiated until the supposed IP was proven to be infected."
The report of this meeting was written by Chris Stockdale. (new window). Read in conjunction with Roger Breeze's article on the Coordination Action website, one feels that there may, at last, be reason for some optimism.

August 8 - 14 2005 ~ "With all Performance Benchmarks met, by government and industry, the goal is to snuff out an outbreak in two weeks after diagnosis by active commitment of all sections of the industry and related industries. .."

The discussion paper by Roger Breeze on Industry Cost Sharing is short and easy to read, illustrating clearly how contributing towards " the costs of an effective program for earliest detection and most rapid effective response to disease" can bring about significant change. From a top-down, one way, series of decisions, cost sharing can make the government an accountable partner. Industry, suggests the paper, can expect "Performance Benchmarks" to be set for such components as an inducement scheme for early reporting, rapid verification, and rapid communications. " ... the government should ....be prepared to demonstrate that it is meeting its Performance promises..."
The paper shows a grasp of what modern technology exists both in combatting illegal imports and in early disease detection and control. Particularly interesting is that the paper also advocates rewarding vigilance instead of threatening negligence:
"The first owner to report a suspicious case that proves to be an infection of concern shall be compensated at four times the value of the stock; those subsequently reporting suspicious cases that prove positive within the first two weeks after a definitive diagnosis shall be compensated at twice the value of the stock.."
Vaccination is assumed as the control method of choice since it would deter agroterrorists' hope of the"drama and visual theater of mass slaughter"
It is to be hoped that as many people as possible read the discussion paper - and give feed-back that will be seen by decision makers. (Register on the same page if it is your first visit.) The article below from Australia shows what happens when farmers feel they have no input into decision making and no control over the risks inherent in imports.

August 8 - 14 2005 ~ China: "... a simple and cost-effective technique to test live and dead animals for the disease,"

Biotech East reports
"The YaSheng Group, a Chinese industrial giant from Lanzhou, Gansu Province, announced today that it had mastered a gene cloning process that allows the creation of fortified cells that combat foot and mouth disease.
Scientists at the company had also developed a simple and cost-effective technique to test live and dead animals for the disease, according to the announcement.
The company reportedly plans to use the technology to develop a vaccine for Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD). ..."
In a global situation where the eradication of animal infectious diseases is more urgently needed than ever, a non-political consideration of effective new technologies and studies across international bounderies is surely vital. As the report of the EU Temporary Committee on Foot and Mouth Disease (paragraph 79 ) said:"Lasting success can be achieved in efforts to control FMD worldwide only if it proves possible, through close international cooperation.. ..."
Similarly, the current Israeli policy to prevent and control FMD (its clear setting out of humane and effective policy should serve as an example to others ) concludes: "... Common, co-ordinated epidemiological studies leading to a common control policy should be sought and supported by the international community."

August 7 2005 ~ Farmers will be even more anxious about importing FMD after an Australian documentary

A news report from Farmonline.com.au. SBS documentary blasts Brazilian beef import fiasco reports that an SBS 'Dateline' documentary has questioned the credibility of Brazil's internal quarantine measures. The programme suggested that "the so-called 'FMD-free zones' within Brazil are highly porous" and that at the time of one import into Australia of Brazilian beef, a new FMD outbreak had been reported in one of the supposed "FMD-free zones".
The program revealed that Biosecurity Australia, at the time, did not inspect conditions in Brazil, before relaxing import restrictions, and subsequently issuing the import licence. (Read in full. The article also expresses concern about PMWS.)

August 5 2005 ~ "Cost sharing offers industry a chance to sit at the table as a partner to make sure that when it pays what is asked, it gets what is promised...."

Roger Breeze's Discussion Paper: Industry Cost Sharing appears today on the Coordination Action website. It is readable, informed and full of clear, good sense. Those who have an interest, who care about the human and animal cost of official disease control, ( many of us not even designated "stakeholders"), and who want to make our voices heard, now have the chance to respond to such articles on the Coordination Action website. It is a chance that should be seized.
Warmwell's comments below, for example, now appear on the FMD forum pages of the CA website which provide a platform for online debate - visible to policy makers and to the OIE and EUFMD/FAO who will undoubtedly take note of interesting comments.
Registering is a simple process requiring no private data except for your real name and email address. Warmwell has no hesitation in recommending that we participate, and hopes that farmers and stockholders will get to hear about the website without delay. The online discussions will be summarised and the summaries will be available.
Today's article by Roger Breeze can be read in full here.

August 5 2005 ~ What good is an Expert Group if Defra doesn't act on their recommendations?

An emailer asked yesterday, "What good is it to have an Expert Group or a SAC who make good recommendations if Defra don't act on them? That is surely not the intention of the EU FMD Directive, but is there anything in it that obliges the government to follow the advice?"
Warmwell has looked at the responses of DEFRA to the 20 recommendations made by the SAC sub-committee. Read in full Briefly, :
• There is no sense of urgency at DEFRA but rather a sense of complacency - as if everything is under control (an unlucky phrase). DEFRA appears not to see that there could be different scenarios requiring different approaches.
• Where is the "permanently operational" expert group as required by the Directive? DEFRA seems to think that the Modelling Consortium (of which few have heard) and Defra itself should direct policy with no outside advice.
• SAC tactfully draws attention to the continuing lack of effective IT systems and the need for the new technologies to be reviewed as a matter of great importance: DEFRA seems to want to wait until the UK develops its own commercial pen-side tests before acknowledging this vital, time-saving technology.
• DEFRA seems unaware of the dangers inherent in its inability to communicate. SAC asks for clarity. DEFRA's impenetrable communications and documents and its reluctance to engage with people at regional and local levels all needs to be addressed. SAC recommends carrots rather than sticks to gain cooperation. DEFRA's responses miss the point, failing to grasp that ordinary people and ordinary farmers are the first line of defence in protecting the country. Such a widespread distrust of DEFRA is worrying. Many farmers are tired of and bored by the constant bureaucratic nagging and no longer interested in reading the glossy DEFRA publications that arrive so frequently.
Full recommendations, responses and warmwell's comments appear on new page here.

August 3 2005 ~scientists in Beijing have developed a test for streptococcus suis which takes just 4 hours to provide results.

ProMed reports "... the Chinese Academy of Inspection and Quarantine announced yesterday, 1 Aug 2005, it has developed a testing method to identify _Streptococcus suis_ in pigs in 4 hours. The technique, known as the "multiple PCR (polymerase chain reaction) testing method," can be used to screen pigs in an "accurate and convenient" fashion, said a statement by an expert panel that assessed and approved the method ...." In yesteday's post, ProMed reports ".. Vaccines to combat a deadly pig-borne disease were flown to south-western China on Sunday [31 Aug 2005], where the spread of the rare illness has already killed 36 people and infected 198. The unusually high numbers of people infected by the swine disease has led scientists to speculate that it may be being spread from human-to-human or that another disease entirely is to blame. ........the size and virulence of this current outbreak, in the province of Sichuan, has taken the World Health Organization by surprise."

August 2 2005 ~ "....the government belatedly realized that the critical monetary yardstick was not the animal product export sector..."

"...but the rural economy as a whole and that protecting animal agricultural interests by not vaccinating was causing huge financial losses in tourism and other sectors that had never been factored into the calculations of outbreak costs." From Roger Breeze's paper Agroterrorism: Betting Far More than the Farm - now available freely on the internet as a pdf file at www.liebertonline.com Extract:
Regulatory officials have not realized that onsite detection is a transforming technology. Onsite detectors should transform disease surveillance and control..... vigorous informed control measures backed by positive diagnosis can be implemented nationally within 6 hours.
.... neighboring herds would be monitored daily for FMD infection (the test will find virus before there are signs of illness), and only infected herds would be killed. Slaughter would not be based on proximity. " Read in full

August 1 2005 ~ Rapid on-site RT-PCR Diagnosis - a curious reluctance on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean

Following Operation Hornbeam, the Science Advisory Council sub group, (which included Professor Roy Anderson and Mark Woolhouse) identified, "major science issues" from the "exercise in its entirety, that require attention in the shorter term." They made some excellent recommendations
Recommendation 13: Accurate pen-side tests should be developed for the diagnosis of FMD in cattle and pigs. The Department should develop the capability to identify further research needs, including a review of current technology and the identification of novel future technologies.
Similarly GAO, the US Government Accountability Office, reported that
"According to experts, on-site use of these tools is critical to speeding diagnosis, containing the disease, and minimizing the number of animals that need to be slaughtered"
The USDA officials responded that " it is important to evaluate the costs and benefits of developing and validating these tools for use outside of a laboratory setting..."
Many are deeply puzzled at the reluctance shown both by UK and US officials to accept the use of the newest technologies that would, without doubt, transform disease control. Lip service is being paid - but neither UK nor US government department appears to acknowledge that on-farm rapid diagnostic tests are already highly developed and already being used in the field. The curious issue of "validation" which has, since the beginning of 2001, been used to justify their not being used is still being bandied about - almost as if it were an essential to making them work. Can anyone throw any light on this matter?

July 30 2005 ~ US still envisaging the slaughter of millions of cattle - Who will Provide the Leadership still not clear

Articles on Agroterrorism for the month of August on CSO online website warn that the number of agencies involved in agriculture and food oversight, the lack of coordination, the lack of clarity about what would happen in an outbreak, all add up to a "toothless tiger "
"... the huge feedlots, large processing facilities and a rapid distribution network .... through the infection of a single animal could lead to widespread infection that would necessitate the slaughter of millions of cattle ...." and "......"We're terribly inefficient in how we approach food safety," says Jerry Gillespie, director of the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security at the University of California, Davis. "Different agencies have different legislative authority. It's also unclear who would be in charge ..."
CSO online.com

July 30 2005 ~ Read again US Agricultural and Food Security: Who Will Provide the Leadership? by Roger Breeze and Floyd Horn.

As long ago as 1999, six years before writing their paper, the authors warned U.S. agricultural and food groups that the US
" was not prepared....unlikely to detect, identify and report; emergency responses were inadequate; working relationships were deficient....state and federal infrastructure would be overwhelmed....The Nation lacks a comprehensive national strategy .... Such a strategy is urgently needed: it will take years to implement and the threats will grow in the meantime. "
When the paper was published in the Proceedings of the 107th Annual Meeting of the U.S. Animal Health Association, San Diego, October 9-16, 2003, pages 79-91, alterations were made, without the knowledge of the authors, that significantly changed the message intended. In particular, their ideas of how rapid, on-site test devices should be deployed were completely changed to create the false impression that validation was the next critical step. As we have said here on warmwell many times, the UK have similar areas of unaccountable blindness - indeed one expert member of last Monday's meeting (see below) said that he was unaware of the issues of rapid diagnositic on-site testing.
In 2001 the outbreak, with its mulit-foci hotspots due to lack of immediate understanding and action, could nevertheless have been efficiently dealt with had the issues of vaccination and rapid on-site testing been properly grasped. To say this is being wise after the event is nonsense. Experts advocating their use were trying very hard to be heard - but were sidelined with unpleasant contempt - one even being termed a Neanderthal. Yet arguments against both vaccination and on-site diagnosis have been shown to be specious. It looks as if the same reluctance to include them properly in Contingency Planning is happening today, perhaps because of ignorance and inefficiency. That it should be deliberate policy seems beyond belief.

July 28 2005 ~ "costs will influence the acceptability of a vaccination-to-live policy to certain sectors or individuals".

(Defra's Regulatory Impact Assessment June 2005)
In spite of the recommendations of the Royal Societies of both London and Edinburgh and the follow-up report of the Royal Society (see here) - a vaccination-to-live policy is, unfortunately, still far from being a foregone conclusion.. The questions asked on Monday to the sub-group of stakeholders concerned with processing and retail, are still raising problems about cost and practicalities. Several of these have been asked before, in 2003, in a consultation exercise. Yet Defra still seem both unclear in answering the meat processors and retailers and keen to shrug off responsibility for any costs that might be shouldered elsewhere.. Unbelievably, "consumers' fears about differentiation" even made an appearance. It is extraordinary that the answer to this after four long years- is not understood by all parties since it was a major (but unnecessary) stumbling block to vaccination in 2001.
DEFRA is now asking, "What proportion of the industry would want to see the derogation sought which enables the ending of the requirement to treat meat from Protection Zones and Surveillance Zones after at least 30 days and for Vaccination Zones at phase 3 of the vaccination programe" Such a derogation already exists, once herds and flocks have been tested, which would permit untreated meat from vaccinated cattle and sheep to be sold freely on the domestic market and "therefore approach more normal market conditions for livestock producers". A derogation also allows for untreated meat from vaccinated pigs to be placed on the domestic market and may, if requested by another Member State, be exported to them with a special mark. This extract from the April 2004 "Vaccination Protocol" makes the current situation clearer - but what remains very unclear is how effectively this information has been understood - even at DEFRA itself.

July 27 2005 ~ Defra's systems of management, information and communication were demonstrated on Monday morning at Page Street.

Questions - Processing and Retailing were not sent out until Friday evening for consideration at the meeting on Monday morning at Page Street. Nearly two years after the EU Directive of September 2003, questions are being posed by DEFRA about practical details concerning its demands. Queries raised by the stakeholders at the meeting about slaughterhouse use and disruption in supplies in the event of an outbreak were met with the view that "it is not part of HMG's remit to resolve supply chain problems" So it was pointed out that if purchasers promptly switched to overseas supplies the resulting cost of getting rid of perfectly usable UK meat would fall on the taxpayer.
At the meeting, it was said that any future outbreak won't be like 2001, that Defra/HMG considers itself to be better prepared, and any future outbreak "would be smaller". It is alarming to discover that there is still a lack of awareness and appreciation of the latest technologies, particularly of rapid on-site diagnosis.
The apparent assumption that the dense and legalistic language of the EU Directive, and in particular of its Annexes about required treatments can be readily followed and understood by anyone concerned reminds one of the story of the Emperor's New Clothes.
The fact is that the Directive is not easy to follow at all.
It had to be pointed out that "heat treated" means "cooked" and that treatments demanded by the Directive applied as much to Protection Zones, Surveillance Zones as to Vaccination Zones.
Defra has now been asked for clarification. "Processing and Retailing" stakeholders want to know what health stamps are, what they look like in reality. They want to rehearse in simulations just what would happen in various phases of an emergency. They want clear graphs and explanations of what will happen in the various zones and to the various species. They want what any member of the smallest organisation would expect from meetings: agendas and notes distributed well in advance, minutes taken, action points decided upon. In short, they want what does not yet exist - good systems of management, information and communication. (See also Inbox)

July 27 2005 ~ "Systems of management, systems of information, systems of communication"

The Lessons Learned Inquiry had, as one ProMed moderator pointed out, " to manoeuvre within a politically challenged landscape ". However, its Chairman, Iain Anderson, made his own recommendations to the EFRA Committee ( he was not expecting to be given the chance) loud and clear:
"....needs to be emphasised again and again is that in order to get this right for the future .... needs to be captured in processes which engages people from different agencies outside of the centre..
... The central importance is that adequate systems are in place ahead of time.... Systems of management, systems of information, systems of communication and all systems robust enough to cope with aggressive and severe challenge...
Speed of response, speed of decision making, speed of action.. through rehearsal and planning and discussion and rehearsal as a routine.."

July 25 ~ Thousands of Cambodian cattle and oxen have been hit by foot-and-mouth disease

Xinhua.net reports that thousands of Cambodian cattle and oxen have been hit by foot-and-mouth disease Yim Voeunthan, Agriculture Ministry secretary of state is quoted as saying that "...vaccines have been given to 1.5 million oxen nationwide to control the spread of the disease."
" In developed countries, mass slaughter of infected cows is the recommended procedure, but Cambodians are too poor for this policy," The Cambodia Daily said.
Meanwhile, in China, virus type Asia 1 is affecting 7 provinces, spread over distances of about 4000 km.

July 20 ~"..removing the source of infection rather than genetic selection is the route of choice for disease control"

One livestock farmer's response to the Hill report. "..... love the part when Hill states that the only way to minimize the risk of BSE is the exclusion of infective materials from the feedchain:
Genetic variation in susceptibility (17-21)
c) Even if genetic differences in susceptibility to infection were revealed, removing the source of infection rather than genetic selection is the route of choice for disease control ........
Who cares about susceptibility if there is no agent that can start a disease ?..."

July 20 2005 ~ The Hill Report on BARBs

Professor William Hill, Emeritus Professor at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology in Edinburgh, has carried out an assessment of the possible causes of BSE cases born after the reinforced feed ban of August 1996 (BARBs) at the request of DEFRA.
Among the many interesting points in the report we read:
"Unless there is new evidence on BSE in cattle that lends support to alternative hypotheses underlying the cause of BARB cases there continues to be little justification for Defra to pursue research on them. Monitoring hypotheses and the free exchange of ideas is, however, encouraged."
Paragraph 29 notes:
" A major EU funded study, FATEPriDE, is underway to examine environmental risk factors that affect the development of prion diseases such as BSE and scrapie (FATEPriDE Web site). The study is focussing on manganese and copper in soils, since replacement of Cu by Mn affects prion protein structure (Brown, D.R. et al., 2000), and on organophosphate pesticides that may influence Cu absorption. The group has brought it to my attention that they are unable to associate these environmental variables with BSE (including BARBs) incidence as they have not obtained the necessary data on location of cases from Defra. It has been suggested (Purdey, 2000) that susceptibility to spontaneous TSEs is affected by mineral imbalance in the ecosystem, but a source of infection remains necessary for BSE to occur, assuming it has a single source."
The report can be seen here as a pdf file. (opens slowly in new window. Click once only)

July 19/20 2005 ~ EU outlines plans to relax BSE restrictions

Dated July 15th 2005, the EU's TSE Roadmap considers the relaxation of many restrictions. This, it implies, is because of " a clear improvement of the situation over the past years due to the risk reducing measures in place" There is talk of ensuring and maintaining the current level of consumer protection - but the Commission proposes, nevertheless, to relax restrictions .
Relaxation of the measures should be ".. risk based and reflect advances in technology as well as evolving scientific knowledge," it opines.
It is the "evolving scientific knowledge" presumably that has finally reached the understanding of the legislators and led to one of the "strategic goals" being to"stop the immediate culling of the cohort." - one of the most outrageous of all the many and manifold rules in place.
The Food Navigator website has more details of what is proposed.
One wonders where "evolving scientific knowledge" leaves such things as the National Scrapie Plan, based as it was on as yet non-existent evidence that BSE can be masked by scrapie. Can a case still be made for the justification of the Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy (England) Regulations 2002 SI 843 ? It was quietly introduced on the day after the Animal Health Bill had been thrown out by the House of Lords and is a measure that allows clear infringement of animal welfare and personal liberties.
Will any voice be raised loudly enough to question the basis on which more than 3 million cattle and £4.6 billion had already been lost by 1999 and caused so many farmers to go bankrupt, losing their business, their livelihood and their homes even before the calamitous policies to combat FMD? In December 2003, Magnus Linklater raised such a voice and there have been others - but dissent in this area tends to get ridiculed, silenced and its funding removed.

July 19 2005 ~Animal Health at the Crossroads

A new report released yesterday by the US National Research Council:
"..... New tools for detection, diagnosis, and risk analysis need to be developed now, and the capacity of the existing animal health laboratory network should be expanded.....
Integrative animal health research programs, in which veterinary and medical scientists can work as collaborators, should be established. ...
The United States must address the importation and health of exotic and wild-caught animals and commit itself to shared leadership roles with other countries and international organizations that address animal disease agents....
. ... a collective effort should be made to raise the level of public awareness about the importance of animal health ..."
One Californian newspaper, Mercury News.com quotes Professor Mark Thurmond as saying that foot and mouth disease "doesn't directly impact human health, but it impacts every pocketbook" Yet the same newspaper, in spite of its article about the report, is still talking about the possible "rapid slaughter and disposal of " California's 300,000 cows.
The executive summary of the report can be seen here. The pdf file of the full report is also free to look at and can be viewed here. (Click once only. Slow pdf files appear after some delay in new window).

July 18 2005 ~ Dr Abigail Woods is to lead a university review of the history of infectious diseases

The review has been commissioned by the Government and will be carried out at the University of Manchester. It is expected to last 3 months and will concentrate particularly on HIV/Aids, TB and foot and mouth disease. Dr Abigail Woods MA MSc VetMB MRCVS, the science historian and vet, wrote A Manufactured Plague and she wrote to warmwell in August last year to tell us that it had been published . Indeed, it was Dr Woods whose work was one of the first reasons for this website to be written at all. Her article in the Guardian in February 2001 just at the beginning of the outbreak, made clear from the outset that the policy being pursued was not correct. In March 2001 Geoffrey Lean, referring to Dr Woods' work, wrote in the Independent:
".... it was Britain, too, that pioneered the zero tolerance policy to foot and mouth, originally to protect a few wealthy stockbreeders, and was the first country to ban imports from countries with the disease. Now, hoist with its own petard, MAFF has no alternative but to continue the slaughter to stop British meat being excluded from export markets that have followed our lead.
Science Daily reports today on the new project. "The report aims to produce a long-term perspective on the detection and identification of infectious diseases and inform policy at a national and international level. The study by the University's Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine (CHSTM) will reflect on the experience of dealing with human and animal disease problems to inform future research and management policies."

July 16 2005 ~ Four years on. The misery continues at Llancloudy

On June 1 this year Kevin Feakins finally won a court order to force the government to remove waste left in the clean-up operation during the foot-and-mouth outbreak of 2001. Now the villagers are up in arms at the way DEFRA is planning to remove the waste that includes 1,000 carcasses - and are threatening to lie down in the road in front of the lorries. They want DEFRA officials to visit the site. Ben Bradshaw says he will meet with them only in London and MP Paul Keetch is puzzled as to why this should be so. The villagers are concerned both about health risks from the waste and the damage that may be caused by the removal of some 8,000 tonnes, including sub-soil - and the involvement of between 700 and 900 lorries on the single-track lanes between their houses. Warmwell's News cuttings include the first "clear-up" at the farm on Thursday 08 March 2001 and other reminders of the suffering of that part of Herefordshire in 2001.

July 15   2005 ~ Breaking News
"...a reliable source of information at several integrated levels to decision makers, scientists and the broad stakeholder community"

Received today (Friday) has been this welcome announcement about the opening of the website for the Coordination Action project for foot and mouth and Classical Swine Fever, funded by the EU.
"The project will focus upon the coordination of research, global disease surveillance, risk analysis, vaccine reserves, diagnostics, laboratory preparedness, and control policies including vaccination, and will initiate new collaborations..... To make this a broad and responsive platform, we seek your participation, especially to contribute to the online discussion fora on topics of interest, to suggest new topics for discussion, and to send us relevant news items.."
".... From a stakeholder perspective, important benefits from this project will be that it will aim:
A. to improve stakeholder involvement in the scientific and technical developments, and
B. to facilitate policy development by providing a reliable source of information at several integrated levels to decision makers, scientists and the broad stakeholder community, and the opportunity to share and discuss concerns and priorities from different perspectives. .."
Read announcement in full. View the website here
(Inbox comment)

July 11 - 16 2005 ~ Bovine TB cases are found in pigs in Cornwall - " it might be only a matter of time before humans are infected"

ProMed has reported the BBC article: "2 pigs and some piglets from a farm near Bodmin ... sent for slaughter... tests showed they had the disease..
.. The State Veterinary Service said it had no record of when it was last informed of a case of bovine TB, as it is not a notifiable disease in pigs "
The ProMed Moderator's comments on the article (read in full) :

[.....Contrary to views expressed by some interviewees, the spillover of bovine TB from the highly infected, dense badger population in Cornwall to other species, wild and domestic porcines included, should not be surprising. Though laboratory confirmation on the species identity of the mycobacterium isolated from the affected pigs (lymphnodes?) should be awaited, it may be assumed that it is _M. bovis_. If the current situation continues, it might be only a matter of time before humans are infected. - Mod.AS]

See also report on TB in wild boar in Spain
Meanwhile, in Minnesota, the first case of Bovine tuberculosis (in cattle) "has been discovered in a cattle herd on the border with Canada - the first finding in Minnesota since 1971- and will lead to the destruction of about 900 animals" according to this report in the Washington Post.

July 11 - 16 2005 ~ "The human health risk from BSE is probably far lower than the risk of choking on a toothbrush.”

An article in Choices, (of the American Agricultural Economic Association) calls for a measured response to BSE Risk The Response to BSE in the United States by John Fox, Brian Coffey, James Mintert, Ted Schroeder, and Luc Valentin of the Department of Agriculture Economics at Kansas State University:
"The human health risk from BSE is probably far lower than the risk of choking on a toothbrush.”
“. . .to suggest, as did Judge Richard Cebull in granting the injunction blocking imports of Canadian cattle, that BSE poses a ‘genuine risk of death for U.S. customers’ is a complete distortion of the concept of what is really risky..."
The article notes that border closure in response to a very low BSE incidence in an exporting country is not endorsed by the OIE, particularly when control measures are in place.
".. a measured response may be one of enhancing the overall stability of food demand and making it less responsive to food scares that occur from time to time.”
To read the paper, go to: www.choicesmagazine.org
The article emphasises the importance of an internationally coordinated response to managing risks from disease, notng that "the potential trade impacts of BSE discovery were not sufficiently weighted in the BSE risk management process”

July 11 - 16 2005 ~ GeneXpert launch expected soon

Cepheid.com (pdf) " The system purifies, concentrates, detects, and identifies targeted nucleic acid sequences, delivering answers from unprocessed samples in as little as 30 minutes.....
... The GeneXpert® System fully integrates and automates the three processes required for real-time PCR-based genetic testing: sample prep, amplification, and detection. Once a biological sample is loaded in a GeneXpert cartridge, the system does the rest...
... Its accuracy and ease-of-use has been extensively validated by a U.S. government interagency working group and by third-party university and private research labs..
.... truly portable, giving the capability to obtain bioanalytical results when and where they are needed...
... integrates the entire genetic identification process, requiring little operator handling or specialized knowledge. Users simply insert the biological sample for testing into a self-contained cartridge, and the GeneXpert System does the rest.
No laboratory facilities or laboratory training for operators is required. When testing is complete, the system will display a positive or negative answer for the presence of the targeted nucleic acid sequences. ."

July 11 - 16 2005 ~ Mr Bradshaw's accusation of "lies and scare-mongering"

Warmwell.com - while acknowledging that there are some at DEFRA who would like to see enlightening change in a Ministry with such sweeping powers - has long been very concerned about DEFRA's apparent inability to understand, communicate or listen. Both the politicisation of the Ministry and its bureaucratic arrogance have caused many farmers to distrust it - just at a time when the cooperation of farmers and fishermen is so vitally important. When DEFRA Minister, Mr Ben Bradshaw used a television debate on Sunday to accuse the Western Morning News of lying after reporting the details of a document actually on the DEFRA website, it is hardly surprising that Jason Groves, WMN's London Editor, should react with surprise. Mr Bradshaw denied that a recent report about the fishing industry, Securing the Benefits, contains the proposal that the inshore fleet of boats under ten metres in length should be charged £1,000 a year for a licence to fish "in order to recover some of the Government's regulatory and enforcement costs". Mr Bradshaw on the BBC's Politics Show, described the WMN's story as "fiction", adding that the BBC's follow-up to the story had been "based on lies and scare-mongering". The relevant paragraph in the report can be seen here. It is bizarre and worrying that Mr Bradshaw should use such vehement language to deny that any such proposal was being considered by the Government when it is there for all to see.

July 9 - 12 2005 ~ Unfit bushmeat and illegally slaughtered meat still coming into the country and ending up in food outlets

The risk of animal - and human - disease being caused by importation of illegally slaughtered bushmeat is a grave and increasing one. There is still a lack of a coordinated response to the problem from government, local authorities, police forces and the Food Standards Agency. Dr Yunes Teinaz, the Senior Environmental Health Officer for Hackney, writes today about a programme coming up on the BBC which he has supported in the hope that resources will at last be poured into protecting the UK from the disease implications of the Bush Meat trade:
Another dirty meat scandal ! This programme highlights the issue of unfit meat supply to takeaways and restaurants . An undercover reporter managed to sell fit meat as unfit to a kebab take away. Tons of illegally slaughtered meat and unfit food ends up in restaurants and takeaways without any public health controls checks or legal action against the perpetrators - who are making millions, tax free, at the expense of the health of the nation.
See also warmwell's Dirty Meat pages

July 8 - 10 2005 ~ No double tagging derogation temporarily approved

The European Union's standing committee on the food chain and animal health has given at least temporary approval for the UK application for the derogation. Sheep farmers will - at least for the time being - be able to continue with the current system of movement (S) and replacement (R) tags instead of having to apply unwieldy, insecure and uncomfortable double tags. (Double tags will still be needed in the case of animals born after 9 July that are intended for intra-community trade.) See DEFRA page last updated in October, and Thursday's Scotsman
However, as with on-site rapid diagnosis technology, electronic identification systems, able to be linked with GIS to locate all domestic animals within Europe, don't seem to be being pursued. A secure, humane and up-to-date system for animal disease monitoring is possible - and yet, in spite of effective use of these technologies in the field, lack of "validation" is quoted as a reason for not adopting them.

1 - 7 July 2005 ~ FMD suspected in Vietnam

http://en.chinabroadcast.cn "Nearly 270 pigs in Vietnam's southern Ca Mau province are suspected of having died from foot-and-mouth disease. A local newspaper reported on Tuesday that testing on 19 samples from about 270 pigs which died last month indicated they could have been infected with foot-and-mouth disease. .Around two thousand pigs in the province have been infected with common diseases and suspected foot-and-mouth disease in the last few months. Local veterinary forces are boosting vaccination among pigs and tightening control over slaughterhouses. .."

1 - 7 July 2005 ~ UN Health experts call for mass vaccination of poultry in Asia. The FAO says it is "too early" for a mass culling of pigs

Since the end of 2003, more than 10 countries have been affected by the avian influenza, with over 50 human victims and with more than 140 million birds killed or culled. The WHO, OIE and FAO are searching for a strategy to keep the H5N1 virus from mutating into a more infectious hybrid capable of infecting humans. The Kuala Lumpur three day meeting, "Risk Reduction Measures in Producing, Marketing and Living with Animals in Asia", has been discussing how to protect workers at farms and markets and to prepare doctors and vets for an epidemic.
Joseph Domenech, the FAO's chief veterinary officer, has stressed the need to include pigs in surveillance plans when an avian influenza outbreak occurs in poultry.
"Avian influenza is not just an Asian problem. No poultry producing country is safe from the occurrence of the avian influenza as longas there are pockets of infection in Asia," he said.
He said that it was too early for "mass killing of pigs, which are a crucial part of farmers' livelihoods and of food security in Asia" and called for more financial support from the international community, urging governments of those affected countries to better share information.
Active coordination on bird flu prevention and control strategies is vital .
Vaccination in risk areas remains one of the tools FAO and OIE have constantly advised to be used, and in some countries, such as in Vietnam, massive vaccination could be the only way to first reduce infection in poultry, which will further reduce human exposure and infection,said Joseph Domenech. The FAO and OIE will organize an international scientific conference next year to assess the results of ongoing research andof field use of veterinary vaccines,
See Google News search page

1 - 7 July 2005 ~ "they worked from the infection to the boundary and never caught up with it..."

The Hexham Courant reports that David Smith, the Haydon Bridge farmer who, as chairman of the National Sheep Association " went head to head with Government ministers during the foot-and-mouth crisis in 2001" has been awarded the George Hedley Memorial Award for outstanding service to the sheep industry. The paper quotes him as saying
“When the foot-and-mouth outbreak started, I spent countless hours travelling from home to London to lobby and talk to ministers. It often felt like I wasn’t getting anywhere; I hardly ever met the minister for agriculture Margaret Beckett, and had to deal with junior ministers who could not give you a direct answer.
Any questions had to be deferred to the minister, and it would take a week or two to get an answer. But we managed to reduce the standstill time. We wanted farmers to be able to trade stock and getting the standstill down to six days did help things.”
He believes the Government could have handled things differently, and hopes that lessons have been learned.
“Things could have been better if they had worked from the 3km boundary to the infection; they could have stopped it from spreading. But they worked from the infection to the boundary and never caught up with it. That is why the infection went round the Cumberland spur. If they tried to get it quicker at the start, there could have been a lot less devastation – they learned nothing from the outbreak in the 1960s.”

1 - 7 July 2005 ~ Foot and mouth outbreak: lessons for mental health services

David F. Peck is Professor of Health Research at the University of Stirling.
"The 2001 foot and mouth disease outbreak in the UK was widespread and devastating. Some areas (e.g. Cumbria) were very badly hit, but all farmers were affected to some degree. Huge numbers of animals, infected and healthy, were slaughtered. Tourism was badly affected. Data from three systematic studies found elevated levels of psychological morbidity among farmers and other rural workers, especially those directly affected...."
An abstract of the paper published in Advances in Psychiatric Treatment (2005) 11: 270-276 can be found here.

1 - 7 July 2005 ~ "Without on-site diagnosis to help monitor neighboring herds, animals would likely be slaughtered based on proximity rather than confirmed infection, unnecessarily magnifying the impact of an attack.

See warmwell's extracts from the pdf file at http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05214.pdf from the US Government Accountability Office. GAO’s stated aim is simply "commitment to good government is reflected in its core values of accountability, integrity, and reliability."
"...... until USDA evaluates the costs and benefits of using rapid diagnostic tools at the site of an outbreak, the agency may be missing an opportunity to reduce the impact of agroterrorism. .... USDA does not use rapid diagnostic tools to test animals at the site of an outbreak. They employ this technology only within selected laboratories. According to experts, on-site use of these tools is critical to speeding diagnosis, containing the disease, and minimizing the number of animals that need to be slaughtered. DOD uses rapid diagnostic tools to identify disease agents on the battlefield, but USDA officials consider this technology to be still under development. Nevertheless, USDA officials told us that they agree it is important to evaluate the costs and benefits of developing and validating these tools for use outside of a laboratory setting..."
Read extracts in full This is a very important report which has has much of relevance to the UK position on animal disease control.

June 27 - 30 2005 ~ Real Time PCR is "the most sensitive test is RT-PCR for the detection of viral RNA"

For avian influenza, use of the RT-PCR diagnosis tool is now considered essential ("The most sensitive test is RT-PCR for the detection of viral RNA": UK Health Protection Agency -pdf - new window)
We can find no mention of RT-PCR in the new Generic Contingency Plan - and it will be remembered that in 2001, the Chief Scientific Advisor, David King, chose to ignore it after Professor Fred Brown had, face to face, explained its use. A stakeholders' meeting about foot and mouth will take place on Wednesday 29th June. (See below comments on the Contingency Plan and its consultation)

June 18 - 25 2005 ~ Bovine TB. 420 vets - "including some of the most respected veterinary scientists in the country" - have now signed the letter to Margaret Beckett.

Of Margaret Beckett and Ben Bradshaw's response to the ever-increasing bovine TB problem Muckspreader in this week's Private Eye, writes that "... They are terrified by the outcry which would follow from the animal rights lobby if they followed the vets’ advice, not least thanks to that £1million ‘bung’ the Labour Party was given by the Political Animal Lobby in 1997..... they set up a committee, the so-called Pre-Movement Testing Stakeholder group, to look into pretty well everything except the possibility of culling sick badgers. The committee duly came up with the kind of blandly meaningless report Defra were looking for. What they hadn’t counted on was that one committee, member, Truro livestock auctioneer Ben Messer-Bennetts, would break cover when the farce was over and protest very loudly that the whole exercise had been a stitch up. ..
.....Even greater embarrassment, however, has engulfed Defra’s other attempt at displacement activity, a three-year plan to investigate the possibility of vaccinating not cattle but badgers. Apart from the tacit admission that it is badgers which are the cause of the problem, the rug has already been pulled from under this plan by none other than Defra’s favourite TB expert Professor John Bourne....." Read in full - and see below for Mr Messer-Bennetts' comments to the Western Morning News

June 18 - 25 2005 ~ " the group had been presented with a "template" for the report at the start of its work"

WMN "....Mr Messer-Bennetts, a member of the nine-strong team that drew up the report (ie on aspects of TB control policy) said the group had enjoyed very little independence. He said the group had been presented with a "template" for the report at the start of its work and that the Defra "observers" who attended all but two of the group's meetings had had "far too much influence" on the debate..." Read the Western Morning News article (June 13) in full

June 18 - 25 2005 ~" the greatest risk is from their neighbours failing to report unusual illness or death among their stock."

ABC.net Au
"The Institute for Rural Futures at the University of New England... found that producers believe the greatest risk is from their neighbours failing to report unusual illness or death among their stock....
...The institute's Elaine Barclay says more attention should be paid to the social effects of disease outbreaks. "The experiences in the UK from the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak of 2001 are still being felt in many parts of that country," Dr Barclay said. ..."
The problem in Britain is that the consequences for farmers if they notice unusual symptoms and report them - the killing of an entire herd for one outbreak of the non-infectious, non-contagious scrapie, for example - will make them think very carefully indeed before reporting "unusual illness or death among their stock" In the UK, trust in the Ministry appears to be at an all-time low. If draconian laws insist on the slaughter of healthy stock then the net result of all the bureaucracy and regulations ostensibly designed to make disease less likely is to make disease more likely. What's more, regulations forbidding on-farm burial will be driving disease underground in more ways than one. Important diseases must be notifiable - but farmers should be encouraged to report them. If people are unreasonably coerced or frightened of the consequences of reporting disease it is inevitable that they will become secretive.

June 18 - 25 2005 ~ At the same time, Defra plans to ‘de-regulate’ the most common of bee disease , called European Foul Brood, (EFB) by making it non-notifiable.

BBKA News ".. This will effectively leave the beekeeper alone in the difficult task of identifying and treating this disease. The net result will be increased frequency and spread of EFB, resulting in loss of bee colonies and a massive reduction in ‘the pollination army’ of honey bees, which currently contribute more than £120 million per annum to agricultural output, according to government figures. There are virtually no wild honey bees left due to the effects of another disease, the varroa mite, which is parasitic. Beekeepers are now the guardians of the honey bee population in the UK."
See also email from farmer in Cumbria and please consider printing, passing round and sending the beekeepers' petition (appears in new window).

June 18 - 25 ~ The FMD stakeholders meeting will take place 15 days after the closing date for consultation on the Contingency Plan

The next DEFRA Stakeholders' meeting, intended to discuss foot and mouth issues, will take place on Wednesday 29 June 2005. The closing date for consultation on the latest Contingency Plan is June 15

June 18 - 25 ~ " the Directive obliges Member States to ensure slaughter of all susceptible animals on premises where FMD is confirmed"

paragraph 2.6 of the REGULATORY IMPACT ASSESSMENT ( pointing out that "the transposition will be carried out by three separate statutory instruments") concerns the change from "discretion to slaughter" to "duty to slaughter" mentioned below
".....The 1981 Act currently gives the Secretary of State a discretion to slaughter in certain situations (including on infected premises) but this is not sufficiently binding to fully implement the Directive. Our policy is to fully implement the Directive and that requires a limited duty be placed on the Secretary of State to slaughter, but only where the Directive absolutely requires it. It is therefore also intended to amend the 1981 Act in respect of FMD to provide the necessary powers to implement the Directive."
It is true that the Directive (page 8) says: "Community measures for the control of foot-and-mouth disease should be based first of all on depopulation of the infected herd.." but one fails to see why the wording of the Animal Health Act is considered not sufficiently binding to fully implement the Directive. The slaughter of infected animals on premises that have been proved to be infected is, for the purposes of pragmatic disease control in countries that are 'disease free without vaccination', deemed necessary and one that hardly needs the say so of a Secretary of State. The changing of the word discretion to duty seems curious. One wonders how a minor change of wording provides the "necessary powers".

June 18 - 25 ~ The EU Directive's definitions of "suspected" animals are clear

While there remains disquiet that the government's Contingency Plan leaves the door open for the killing of healthy animals as a quick-fix method of creating a "firebreak", it is worth reading the Directive for its definition of those animals that may be swiftly and humanely killed as part of the disease control policy.
(i) "animal suspected of being infected" means any animal of a susceptible species exhibiting clinical symptoms or showing post-mortem lesions or reactions to laboratory tests which are such that the presence of foot-and-mouth disease may reasonably be suspected;
(j) "animal suspected of being contaminated" means any animal of a susceptible species which, according to the epidemiological information collected, may have been directly or indirectly exposed to the foot-and-mouth disease virus;
(These definitions would have excluded literally millions of those healthy animals and their young slaughtered during 2001)

June 18 - 25 ~ Illogical and unjust. The TB test for cattle is known to be deeply flawed - but DEFRA will not test badgers because "no reliable test for live badgers is yet available"

In spite of the insouciance of much of DEFRA's 2005 report, those at the sharp end of government regulations and bureaucracy are becoming more and more depressed by the widening gulf between reality and DEFRAspeak about animal disease.
As we saw in the example of one WMN article this week, there is an illogicality and cherrypicking of "science" that is effectively killing off livestock farming in many areas of the UK.
The recent past has seen anything but the "... caring for rural England and delivering a sustainable future for farming..." of the Report's Chapter One.
UK Foot and Mouth policies saw the unnecessary deaths of literally millions of healthy sheep, cows, lambs, calves and pigs, including heavily pregnant animals, rare breeds and breeding stock. The cruel absurdity of killing a companion group, herd or flock for a disease such as scrapie that is not infectious nor contagious - makes genuine veterinary science weep.
Regulations for BovineTB have killed more even than FMD 2001 - but it is not something the general public knows or cares about because the media - with some noble exceptions - are silent. DEFRA quietly insists that farms must be immobilised and reactor animals killed on the results of a flawed test. Yet they use as justification for NOT testing in other circumstances, the argument that a test might not be 100% accurate. This is surely not a logical exercise of the much vaunted "precautionary principle."

June 18 - 25 ~ "These simple measures could reap major savings for both animal life and the tax payer.."

We are living at a time when research funding appears to be limited only to those who don't rock the boat. Alternate theories that might save the country literally millions and bring back some sanity to farming do seem to be being ignored. An email today from Mark Purdey about the possible influence of increased iron levels in the pasture grasses of TB hotspots and resulting excess iron uptake in the biosystem of the grazing animals:
"....Trials in an area of intensive mycobacteria infestation in Michigan , involved the liming of pastures of the affected farms which produced a ten fold reduction in incidence of the infection. Why does DEFRA ignore this kind of published study?"
Why indeed? Mark Purdey thinks that Ben Bradshaw is right to resist calls for a widespread cull of badgers. "Both badgers and cattle develop TB due to their separate exposure to the same iron-rich foodchain - and not by cross-infecting one another. For much research has shown that iron is an essential prerequisite in the TB disease process, enabling the TB mycobacterium to take a hold in the body....government should be looking into the option of subsidising farmers to spread lime in the TB affected/high iron areas, as well as feeding their cattle with iron-chelating lactoferrin protein. These simple measures could reap major savings for both animal life and the tax payer.

June 18 - 25 ~ "You need to slaughter the goat that has the disease and incinerate it if necessary - but not the whole herd..."

Scrapie is not an infectious or contagious disease. This fact is not preventing whole goat herds from being culled if one animal is found to be suffering from scrapie. The WMN reports on one farmer's exasperation with the DEFRA mindset where killing appears to have little to do with risk or science. A spokesman for Defra said the policy towards scrapie had been adopted because it had the potential to "mask" underlying BSE. But the whole BSE question itself poses far more questions than certainties (see BSE page) and the wholesale slaughtering of healthy animals will do nothing at all to protect humans or animals from disease.
" Totnes MP Anthony Steen, who has written to Defra through the department's Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Ben Bradshaw, MP for Exeter. And Mr (Neil) Parish, MEP for the South West and a Somerset farmer, has also vowed to take up the issue with the European Commission. He said the disease was "not contagious".
read in full

June 12 - June 17 ~ Consultation letter is highly misleading on the subject of required meat treatments

Defra's Foot and Mouth Disease (Control of Vaccination) Draft (96 KB) was updated on Wednesday June 14th 2005. The consultation letter is dated June 9th. The part of the summary letter relating to the treatment required for meat in the affected "zones" and for vaccinates leaves out the important hard-won derogations.
Why?
The letter suggests that "new" requirements of the FMD Directive require that "Fresh meat and meat products from animals originating or produced in protection