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Foot and Mouth - UK - August 2007           emails

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August 10/13 ~ Dairy herd on the Pirbright estate

"Samples can be obtained by taking blood, but also non-invasively from the nose and from milk". The email from Mary Marshall below raises the important issue of testing milk. This, as she says, can be done quite easily without the need to inject into the skin.
We are now wonderering if it was being done as a matter of simple routine on Pirbright animals. It has come to our notice that the milk collection service for the dairy herd on the Pirbright estate was cancelled on Wednesday, August 1st, 24 hours before Mr. Pride on his own farm rang his vet about clinical signs in his catttle.
No mention has been made of this herd on the Pirbright estate. Is it still alive? Was FMD found in milk samples? Was a candidate animal to test supposedly inert dead vaccine found to be clinically infected, and did that alone stop the routine milk collection?
We are still wondering which was, in fact, the index case in this outbreak. But even this, interesting as it may to those of a detective bent, is not as important for disease control as the central fact: Testing milk for FMD virus is straightforward. If virus is anywhere where there is a dairy herd it can be pinpointed easily by testing the milk. Is it being done?

August 10/13 ~ "VS recognizes the value of milk as a sample for FMD surveillance, as well as the value of this test in moving milk safely inside of quarantine zones.." The United States Animal Health Association

but the USAHA document here continues: " ARS and APHIS have done proof-of-concept work using the ARS/Tetracore developed real-time PCR assay for FMDV nucleic acids in milk......Due to the loss of some crucial staff at Foreign Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory (FADDL), they have not been able to move ahead with the optimization of this assay for milk...By March 2006, FADDL should have in a place a Head for the newly formed Proficiency and Validation Services Section, which will enable them to move forward with the optimization and validation of this assay in milk....."
So, a familiar story of underfunding and frustrating difficulties. News of progress with this would be gratefully received.
( Incidentally, and as many now know, the ARS/Tetracore developed real-time PCR assay was the very machine that Sir David King turned away in 2001. Magnus Linklater when the journalist asked Professor King, UK's Chief Scientific Advisor, why it was not being considered was apparently told "I would need five hours to explain the science to you," he said. "Unfortunately I don't have that time." )

August 10/13 ~ More slaughter imminent - unless movement restrictions can be eased

Another aspect of the frozen situation in Surrey is the welfare issue. The restrictions on livestock movements are now causing problems of overcrowding. Issues of providing food, drink and temporary housing are becoming critical, particularly on intensive pig farms.
In 2001, movement restrictions led to scenes of utter misery for animals. So-called "welfare culls" killed healthy animals as much as the panicky contiguous culling did. Literally millions of animals died in horrible conditions; not just those who - in that much repeated phrase - "would have been slaughtered anyway". The loss of breeding stock was terrible but it was grim to see even meat animals consigned to such an end.
The NPA, alive to any political pressure that can be applied, is asking producers to keep a photographic record of their mounting pig welfare problems and warning that piglets will have to be killed "in-situ". This is a situation that is going to have to change urgently. Scotland and Wales, but not England, are allowing controlled welfare movements.

August 10/13 ~ " the laboratory must move into the field and test animals quickly before irreversible actions are taken." ProMed

'ProMED' means 'Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases' and is the Internet-based reporting programme of the International Society for Infectious Diseases (ISID). The moderators are international experts in their field who screen, review, and investigate reports before posting to the network. ProMED-mail is independent and free of political constraints. To read on ProMed that diagnostic testing should now be "out of the laboratory" is very cheering. On Saturday, a ProMED moderator, in the course of a five paragraph comment about the UK situation, (www.promedmail.org)wrote:
"....In the past -- that is, pre-1980 -- when we killed "contact" herds it was not questioned and laboratory techniques then could not have handled the volumes of samples. Today all that is different and thousands of samples are run each day. This brings home the point that the laboratory must move into the field and test animals quickly before irreversible actions are taken..." (More)
For six years warmwell and others have been asking that the analysis of samples should happen at the place where samples are actually taken, using already available, ever more affordable diagnostic kits, rather than be taken by car, train or air to the reference laboratory. Results can now be obtained in the field within minutes rather than hours and days, can detect FMDv before the onset of clinical disease and the "irreversible actions" such as we saw at Hunts Hill farm can be avoided. The "prototype RT-PCR" mentioned to our correspondent seems not to have been used on the suspect pig there. It is hard for an outsider to discover much - yet we read here for example:
"...We have performed 5 minimal infectious dose experiments with FMDV type O1 Lausanne using the original "Pirbright set-up" although using updated technology ......Two diagnostic methods for very fast, sensitive and specific detection of FMD virus using real time RT-PCR has been submitted, one of them for UK Patent and the other for international patent protection. DEFRA has naturally been granted unrestricted access to testing of samples from the UK using the new assays..."
Even on a farm with a lame pig so close to an IP, it seems that precipitate action might have been avoided. Mention of patents does make one consider what the reason might be for the apparent secrecy surrounding the use of rapid diagnosis in the UK . Ironic perhaps then that we were reliably told this week that "the whole portable PCR field will be transformed with very cheap machines that are highly automated within the year".

August 10/13 ~ "The government has a responsibility to use the technologies that can identify disease before signs appear if these technologies are available. They are available, and they are being used in the lab. ."

Mary Marshall's email suggests that the present practice of testing only sheep in a high risk area is a practice that should be challenged. She asks the question that has evidently occurred to many in addition to ourselves:
"Why were samples not taken as part of the inspections, from the first day and subsequent days, from ALL of the susceptible animals on a contiguous farm, especially if Defra considers the animals on these farms to be of such high risk? "
"... If virus is detected outside the surveillance zone, vaccination should then be automatically triggered. If no virus is detected outside the surveillance zone over several days, possibly coupled with more widespread testing of milk, then an easing of movement restrictions in other regions of the UK would be justified." Read in full. Quoting the ProMed comment above, she concludes, " To implement the diagnostic policies that I suggest, the government must be committed to provide a 21st century biocontainment facility as part of a national disease control strategy and ensure that their labs have sufficient resources and funding to function effectively. "

August 10/13 2007 ~ " Whilst hoping for the best, a point source, we should have taken precaution against the worst, a plume."

Ruth Watkins, MRCP MRCPath (a specialist in Clinical Virology) in the paper written this weekend especially for warmwell and farmtalking, has given ten reasons why she is convinced that vaccination in this outbreak should have been undertaken. She also gives a fascinating insight into her field of expertise: the microscopic world of cells and how vaccine protects them from attack by wild virus. She explains, "All virus families have different characteristics, and to some we may never be able to make protective neutralising antibody at all such as Hepatitis C virus. How lucky we are to have such a good vaccine against FMD - it is theoretically possible to eliminate FMD from the world by vaccination....decades of scientific research has provided us with excellent vaccine to all the major serotypes of FMD virus.".
As she says, we are lucky too that
"...that we have these scientific and vaccine establishments in the UK, and we should be ready to take advantage of the benefits they can give us."
Her email and paper can be read here. She warns, " With global warming we may expect the incursion of a number of exotic viruses into the domestic animals of Northern Europe, which - if they are insect borne or infect a wildlife reservoir - may not be eliminated. May we have diagnostics and vaccines ready to meet them..."

August 10/13 ~ FMD - uncomfortable issues still to answer

The Lightwater site, at Worldpress.com succinctly sets out the issues that are worrying many of us. Underfunding, maladministration, government spinning that they are not to blame - particularly the leaking of information about Merials staff and their operation "aimed at deflecting criticism from Government" Read in full

August 10/13 2007 ~ the role of rapid on-site RT-PCR during this outbreak

Saturday morning saw confirmation of negative results for the Matthews calves and DEFRA's revocation of the temporary zone around Manor Farm. The Today programme (Saturday) interviewed the free-range farmer whose 362 animals were killed as a precaution. Mr Emerson at Hunts Hill farm revealed that vets had been checking with him every day but on Wednesday, one lame pig with slight lesions just above the hoof (coronary band) gave enough cause for alarm that samples were taken. After lengthy discussions with Page Street it was decided - on the strength of this one pig and because Hunts Hill farm was so close to the other two outbreaks- to kill all the animals on site, of all species, immediately. (The pig was, in fact, clear of disease as were all the other animals. Mr Emerson was quoted: "knowing now that my animals were never infected makes it worse.")
Pigs can excrete a great deal of virus early on if infected, true - but what of these samples? It would be interesting to know if they were or were not checked by rapid on-site diagnosis. We should very much like to know more about the role for all speciesof the rapid on-site RT-PCR being used by the UK as an indicator of disease in its various phases. Which species are being tested by rapid diagnosis and how often - in short, exactly how is the new technology being applied during this outbreak? Or is this - for reasons one can only guess at - information that must be kept secret? There are many others who want to know about rapid testing. One of the most recent emails to warmwell, from the Chairman of Mitchell's Auction Company in Cumbria, reminds us yet again of the UK refusal to contemplate testing real time RT-PCR back in 2001.

August 10/13 2007 ~ We fear a bad end and a wrong answer to the question of ultimate responsibility.

Our summary of the situation so far before we collapse into the weekend: Pirbright is a 'government' laboratory but it has no government power to control events. It survives at the whim of the Government and of the Treasury. It cannot criticise its paymasters. Like so much else whose usefulness ought to be taken for granted and isn't, Pirbright has been starved of funding, equipment and staffing and has suffered a loss of morale. Yet the expertise we need is still based at Pirbright. It is not Pirbright's fault if commercial considerations, including its close relationship with Merial, have had to take the place of its former "public service" ethos - and it is not Pirbright that is shaping policy; it is the politics that needs big business as its life blood. Farmers across the country are suffering for what happened in Surrey and a lot has been said about the irony that the crisis came from the very Institute set up to avert it. Perhaps live virus in a vaccine being tested somewhere on the Pirbright site failed fully to be attenuated or got out by human means. As in all walks of life, this sort of thing can happen. But we fear a bad end and a wrong answer to the question of the ultimate responsibility for what happened at Pirbright.
The jackals are gathering. Reputations and careers may be made sacrifices in the financial storm that's coming. It is, as always, the big players who will battle over big money. The drama of "who was to blame" will unfold like something on reality TV. Throughout this whole crisis mainstream journalists have missed by miles the key question, which is this:
Is it right that our disease control policy is based wholly on unfair and out-of-date "health" regulations, forcing those decent small farmers, who also need to make a profit, to fight the Goliath of the non-vaccination policy?
It is the EU's protectionist policy, enshrined in the OIE regulations that discriminate against vaccination in returning disease free status, that constantly postpones a more sane, more humane, science-based animal health policy in the UK. The Pirbright virus escape would - in a less crazy world - have been a small local irritation, quickly solved by the ability of available modern technology to cure and protect.

August 10 2007 ~" If the present policy is successful, it will be a measure of good luck in ignoring these two variables..."

Email received this afternoon from Dr Colin Fink (Clinical Virologist & Hon. Senior Lecturer in Biological Sciences University of Warwick) He says, in brief, that Debby Reynold's latest briefing was "reasonably coherent" but that the present 'no vaccination' strategy , makes no acknowledgment of the possibility of wild life vectors. (See also below) Dr Fink says
" the present policy assumes one distribution of virus by primary intent only ( ? accident ? sabotage ). Vaccination around the present areas, as I suggested earlier would prevent any further environmental virus distribution from having much clinical effect and would lower any re-excretion rates of virus into the environment. - a basic tenet of vaccination.
If the present policy is successful, it will be a measure of good luck in ignoring these two variables.
One of the more worrying aspects of the clinical presentation of the second affected animal group in this outbreak, was the profound onset of the illness simultaneously in a number of animals. This strongly suggests a high viral load within the environment that infected this group all together. That to my mind would be one reason why vaccine for this outbreak should be used sooner rather than later."
Read in full

August 10 2007 ~ Miserable news. We got so used to this in 2001...

Livestock culled on Hunts Hill farm did not have foot and mouth disease. DEFRA says that tests on the 362 cows, sheep, pigs and goats slaughtered on Wednesday, (some of which may have appeared to have initial clinical symptoms of foot and mouth), show that none of these animals were, in fact, carrying the foot and mouth virus.
Horrible news. See first paragraphs of the Telegraph article. And it casts doubt on our assumption below that they would not have been culled unless an on-site rapid diagnosis, rather than mere clinical inspection, had indicated disease. Ironically, these negative results will be seen as good news - and of course in a way, it is. But failure of rapid diagnosis - reliance on a clinical diagnosis that turns out to be wrong - this is shameful when we have access both to excellent diagnostic equipment giving results within a fraction of the time it takes in the lab and vaccines that will, as Dr Fink says above, "prevent any further environmental virus distribution from having much clinical effect and would lower any re-excretion rates of virus into the environment." Killing first and checking afterwards is something we had hoped could never happen again in a modern civilised country - and it does nothing at all to protect others.
So much for our optimism about the possible efficient deployment of on-site rapid testing. The question must remain: why were these animals killed? What machine is being used for on-site testing? What was the reason to keep paths open near infected farms? Nick Green got some distinctly odd replies to his questions today.

August 10 2007 ~ "..we could still find ourselves in the bizarre situation where the meat on the shelves is imported from countries where Foot and Mouth Disease is prevalent "

In the Scotsman, Dan Bugloss says of Brazil, "...the Irish party confirmed suspicions that the vaccination regime was haphazard at best and sometimes completely non-existent. Meanwhile, the EU continued to import Brazilian beef, allegedly from regions declared clear of the disease....
Yorkshire Dales Country News today quotes Dr Charles Trotman, CLA's Rural Economy Adviser: " "understanding between parties in the food chain is essential .... I hope that the chief executives who control the big supermarkets will instruct their meat buyers to... avoid the temptation to try and make a quick profit at the expense of those who have had to shoulder the economic burden of this disease."
Douglas Chalmers, Director CLA North told the paper that " we could still find ourselves in the bizarre situation where the meat on the shelves is imported from countries where Foot and Mouth Disease is prevalent. Not only would this compound the agony for home producers, but it would have had a longer term effect for British farmers and processors. With home produced meat now available again, it is to be hoped that no one will try to take advantage of the situation..."

August 10- 13 2007 ~ Suspect animals were to be monitored, not immediately culled on suspicion

The latest available DEFRA interim epidemiology report can be found at www.defra.gov.uk [PDF] (500 KB) (apologies. Link mended - but it is slow) or here. It shows the situation as at 10:00 am yesterday and tells us that since 3rd August 2007 suspicion of FMD has been reported on 37 holdings, in the counties shown in the table it shows.
"Five holdings are still under investigation; disease has been ruled out on the remainder."
Movements from Surrey have been traced: "para 23. Investigations have confirmed that no sheep from Surrey or from the surveillance zone that overlapped into the neighbouring county of Hampshire were moved to or sold through Bicester sheep fair at Thame market on 3rd August. 24. In summary, the risk of spread of infection out of Surrey through movements of silently infected sheep during the risk period is very low."
Within the zones, testing seems (to us) to have been very efficiently carried out.
A "dangerous contact" had been identified next to the second outbreak; a single holding that is "highly likely to have been exposed to infection through a personnel contact ... Additionally, stock on the DC premises are adjacent to the IP and only separated from it by a farm track and a lane."
However, these animals were, according to the Aug 9 report (10.00 am) , to be carefully monitored every day rather than culled on suspicion. "target=new> Read report (pdf)
All this suggests to us that a rapid on-site portable PCR test may well have found evidence of disease on the free range farm where the 362 animals were killed yesterday. However, we still wait for news of the lab test results.
UPDATE: As we say above and the Telegraph very brefly reports, all the cows, pigs, sheep and goats at Hunts Hill Farm turned out to be free of infection.

August 10 2007 ~ " it has been decided not to vaccinate at this time."

A new DEFRA statement has appeared "....In line with this decision tree and the emerging conclusions of epidemiology investigations it has been decided not to vaccinate at this time. However, this approach will be kept under constant review as the disease situation develops and the Forward Vaccination Centre will be kept in place.
As part of the evidence base for this decision Defra has today published an interim epidemiology report into the outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease in Surrey...."

August 10 2007 ~ Information about differentiation tests needs to be clearer. (Boring but very important)

Yesterday's Farmers Weekly article "Vaccine best for foot-and-mouth?" reported that Dr Tony Andrews "... believes there would be difficulty in acknowledging the difference between a vaccinated animal or infected animal and, therefore, stresses the need for clearer answers...." but Anthony Gibson of the NFU (and we remember his sense and humanity in 2001 with gratitude) said the NFU was confident there was a validated test.
Dr Andrews is right that things need to made clearer. We begin to understand his stance on vaccination (even though we do not share it). The OIE Code Commission have accepted the principle of herd based NSP serosurveillance as a basis for countries regaining FMD free status. In other words, while tests to distinguish vaccinated from unvaccinated animals are accepted in the OIE Terrestrial Animal Health Code
("... a serological survey is conducted to demonstrate that antibodies to the disease are as result of vaccination and not natural infection.")
- there is STILL not yet an internationally accepted NSP (non-structural protein) test for individual use in any species. The test shows whether antibodies, produced when the animal tried to fight off real live virus, are present in the blood. Such antibodies are NOT produced as a result of vaccination so differentiation can be made. Even though tests - such as those assessed in 2004 by Bruderer et al - are shown to be effective, the OIE will, at present, only accept whole herd tests for the purposes of international trade. Full validation for individual tests requires panels of seven FMD serotypes in at least three target species. Testing has to be carried out in high security accommodation - and needs to be carried out where both vaccination and exposure to virus can occur. We speculate that work has been going on recently at Pirbright. It seems to warmwell more than likely that this testing may be significant in the present crisis. Meanwhile, it is a dreadful irony that such work cannot continue. Once it is done then the last (non trade) obstacle to vaccination will be removed. And as page 37 Version 1.2 - ( Volume 2 Foot and mouth disease) of DEFRA's Exotic Animal Disease Generic Contingency Plan (Consultation Version- July 2006) makes clear:
Public opinion - Public are likely to support a vaccinate to live policy and this would be in line with FMD Inquiry recommendations. Food Standards Agency advice is that labelling of products from vaccinated animals would not be required. A shared statement (i.e:here) on the use of vaccination as part of FMD control strategies has been produced in partnership with consumer organisations.
In April we wrote about the question of "Validation" (only when it suits) "... It needs to be pointed out and repeated that the mathematical modelling that drove that discredited 2001 policy was not validated and no validation was ever attempted. As Dr Martin Hugh-Jones commented: "Any model is only as good as its ability to be validated....One of the criticisms of the Anderson FMD model was that it could not be validated. Nor, for that matter, was validation ever attempted with the very expensive result that we all witnessed."

August 10 2007 ~ NFU moves towards court case

www.thelawyer.com "South West firm Thring Townsend was instructed yesterday (9 August) by the National Farmers Union (NFU) in relation to a potential action for losses suffered by farmers as a result of last week's foot and mouth outbreak."

August 10 2007 ~ New Case is NOT foot and mouth "I just wanted to be 100% sure"

The farmer involved, Laurence Matthews, at Manor Farm, says that he had called DEFRA as a precaution when he noticed a possible problem with some of his calves - especially since it was his land that was involved in the second outbreak; John Gunner's animals. He says there has been "no traffic" between his farm (calves only) in Wotton and the second outbreak site at Normandy. The calves (3 - 5 weeks old) are all housed in the same building and any infection can spread easily. Mr Matthews is reassured that the suspect calves are now looking a lot better. Confirmatory tests will be known this afternoon - but one assumes that rapid diagnostic on-site PCR was used to ensure such confidence this morning..
There is no news yet about the test results from the 362 animals killed yesterday. 576 animals have been destroyed so far and the human misery this causes is examined by the Telegraph today. "Every animal has its own unique value to us," said the free range farmer yesterday. "We were absolutely devastated."

August 10 2007 ~ A new possible case. A New Temporary Control Zone

Late last night an announcement was made that a new control zone has been placed on a site in Surrey outside present areas. There was frustration as no further details emerged. The new 3km zone is now known to be east of the existing surveillance zone and southwest of Dorking. DEFRA's emergency response centre at Reigate is not far away. The Times is raising the spectre of sabotage again. All DEFRA would say is: "This precautionary measure follows an inconclusive assessment of clinical symptoms by Animal Health veterinary staff. The national movement ban remains in place. In addition, in the Temporary Control Zone, general licences will not apply for the movement of animals to slaughter and collection of dead animals from farms." but fears that the outbreak of foot and mouth disease had spread from the initial control zone is going to send shivers through the farming community. More as soon as we know.
There are those who have the time and interest to wait in front of television, radio and the internet for news. Farmers, whose stomachs are turning, many of whom have no representation, have to get on with the farming day. They - unlike the officials working hard in Surrey - are not able to earn overtime. Open information, given as soon as it is known, is important and we cannot see any "public good" reason why it should be withheld.
UPDATE - see above.

August 10 2007 ~ Defra can find the time and money to send us all pointless bumph that we don't need, let alone have time to read, but when the countryside is hit with something like FMD we get absolutely nothing

An ironic query sent by a farmer needs no further comment.
The NPA site too had included, just before its jokey footnote about painting pigs black and white, the sentence
"There is also a desire among the vets for an improved cascade of information from Defra in London. ..."
but we note that this sentence has now been removed.

August 9 ~ The Ministry knows best....

More on the subject of getting the science wrong, non-admission of Government mistakes, official ignorance, compensation claims side-stepped...but this is a different problem and one that spans 30 years. A document Sheep dipping - Advice for farmers and others involved in dipping sheep has appeared on the Health and Safety Executive website. It contains grim warnings about sheep dipping.
Sheep dips, (designated 'veterinary medicines') were found to eradicate scab in sheep, thirty years ago, if they contained organophospherous compounds. These had actually been developed as chemical warfare agents. Farmers themselves, such as the doughty campaigning Lancashire farmer, Brenda Sutcliffe, became aware that OPs were causing depression, brain damage and premature death and demanded their total ban. But the Ministry knew best. Until 1989, the law required compulsory dipping twice a year. By 1992, dipping for scab at last ceased to be compulsory but MAFF (now DEFRA) announced instead that it would not hesitate to prosecute sheep farmers who did not deal promptly and satisfactorily with an outbreak of scab.
Fear of compensation demands have, as often before and since, made the government very chary about any admission of responsibility. The wording of the HSE document is careful. Warnings are general and apply to all dips. However, the sentence,"Some agricultural pesticides contain OP or SP active ingredients. These products are not authorised for use as veterinary medicines and must never be used for this purpose" would seem to be incontrovertible. (The FWi article today brought our attention to the existence of the booklet.)

August 9 ~ Bad news that can't be buried

Unfortunately, the Fallen Stock relaxation is hardly making much of an improvement. For those who remember The Good Life, this is the Margo Leadbetter method of collection; picking one runner bean at a time and carrying it delicately across the garden to a sack. The Fallen Stock vehicle can go to one farm for collection - but then it must return to base for Cleaning and Disinfection (C&D). So instead of maybe 30 - 40 carcasses per day, they will be lucky to collect 4. There will be a problem with leakage and smell. A bit of a stink.
Scotland, we hear, have allowed on-farm burial at least in the short term. As one emailer writes today, "Pity the fallen stock aren't a bit closer to the minions in Page St." Yes, and pity the Fallen Stock scheme, has been clung to for fear of admitting it was a piece of "legislative madness" ( as Dan Buglass in the Scotsman put it) to begin with.

August 9 ~ "the worker bees at the local Defra office do try to be helpful, despite the insane orders they receive from headquarters..."

Jonathan Miller's top ten are now up. For the jaded, they are as refreshing as a cold beer pressed to one's forehead. Others may not be quite so refreshed. His list of the good, the bad and the ugly begins; "Never mind the disinfectant, send the whitewash..." However, as our choice for a paragraph title shows, he is very happy to give credit where it is due, and from others we have heard, the DEFRA footsoldiers in Surrey do indeed seem to have been human and kindly. Sad agreement too with the following on the subject of the internet:
"....while the networks are activating quickly, frankly we lack real political clout. We do not have a clunking great fist. The challenge is to convert our command of the facts and superb intelligence into meaningful pressure. I admit this is a tough problem when our democracy is so intangible, and note that it is a problem not unique to this issue..."
Read in full
UPDATE Even so, and although Jonathan Miller is undoubtedly right, the bloggers are uniting...( Alas, this cartoon will have to self destruct very soon)
Here, back in the fray, is the famous organic centre Sheepdrove,: "Join us in calling for the right to vaccinate now...Why not let the farmers decide? We could use our own risk assessments and make a decision on whether or not to protect our stock against FMD."

August 9 ~ Another twist - of the knife

HSE are investigating a case of Legionnaires' Disease at IAH Pirbright, thought to predate the problems with virus escape ( the escape estimated to have been in the third week of July according to Fred Landeg ( pdf ec.europa.eu) . We discover from the IAH annual report dated 2004, that the ISO10 building at Pirbright, where the person with Legionnaires disease had been working, had been built the previous year to replace SAPO-4/ACDP-2 containment level accommodation
"for work on exotic viral diseases and vaccine development."
In other words, the lab where exotic viral diseases and vaccine development has been taking place was an environment where a worker could have caught a disease. According to this HSE account of a tragedy in 2002, that case was caused the failure of biological monitoring of the ventilation system. "...Vacancies in management posts were blamed for the shortage of risk assessments and absence of in-house monitoring." Underfunding perhaps.
The BBC report tells us " Legionnaires' Disease is caused by a bacterium that causes problems if it is converted into aerosol form from a water - for instance, in showers or spas - and then inhaled."

August 9 ~ Updated questions and answers at DEFRA

Click here for Tuesday's updated "FMD disease emergency vaccination - question and answer brief" from the DEFRA site. See also DEFRA's general Question and Answer page Aug 2007 - section on vaccination Extract:
"Suppressive vaccination (to kill) might be considered where the number of animals to be culled is likely to exceed the immediately available disposal capacity. In those instances, animals in defined areas would be vaccinated first and slaughtered only as disposal capacity became available. It could also be used where there is an urgent need to reduce the amount of virus circulating in an area and reduce the risk of spread beyond that area."
This is just "stamping out" by another name. The worst of all possible worlds for the animals and for the farmer.
Killing vaccinates rather than keeping them together would seem to make no sense. Anyone who has understood Notes on Vaccination and Transmission will see why. We are depressed to see mention of "suppressive" vaccination in the brief.
We notice too from Fred Landeg's presentation to the Standing Committee on Food Chain and Animal Health (SCoFCAH), ( pdf ec.europa.eu) in Brussels yesterday made no mention of vaccination in the presentation but did give further details - for example that the first lesions were dated 26th July and the clinical symptoms- first noticed on the sick animals on 29th July- were reported the following Thursday 2nd August. FMD was confirmed the next day and it became public knowledge that Friday night.
As we know, Member States are allowed to proceed straight away with emergency vaccination. No permission needs to be sought from the EU. The updated brief may be possibly be preparing us for something.

August 9 ~ Dutch Socialist Party MP backs vaccination and calls for EU policy to be changed to make vaccination compulsory

Krista van Velzen wants to see preventative vaccination against Foot-and-Mouth Disease made compulsory. She was quoted (Tuesday) in the online edition of the SP (Dutch Socialist Party) newspaper: "The outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease in Great Britain has once again made it clear that the current EU policy is wrong" adding that there is no support in the Netherlands for such animal-unfriendly policies. The Dutch MP is calling on agriculture minister Gerta Verburg to put the argument at European level for compulsory vaccination. (Many thanks to Brent for this link)
It may be remembered that Dutch farmers, having been promised that their vaccination policy in 2001 was to allow animals to live, were then appalled to learn that all vaccinates were going to be slaughtered after all. An eminent Dutch vet from Utrecht, Peter Poll, said at the Bristol Conference in England in 2001 that he thought it very likely that the Dutch veterinary associations themselves " will no longer cooperate in an eradication programme as carried out in Spring 2001" .

August 9 ~ "Some days I've taken 12 showers" says Dr. John Copps, deputy director of the National Centre for Foreign Animal Disease in Winnepeg

From www.canada.com ".....Dr. Copps..... who is monitoring the outbreak in Britain that may have been caused by a lab breach.... "Anything they learn, we'll try learn from them." .... says the federal lab near downtown Winnipeg, which houses the only live foot-and-mouth virus in Canada, has the advantage of being much newer and farther from farms than the British lab under investigation. "Some days I've taken 12 showers," he says, as evidence of the multi-layered safety procedures at the Manitoba lab, home to some of the nastiest diseases on earth."

August 9 ~ New cull involves "suspected"cows - but also sheep, pigs and goats at a farm advertised as "free range"

From the moderator (AS) at ProMed today. "We are informed by ProMED-mail rapporteur Joe Dudley that according to local media reports, the new culling operation involves cows, sheep, pigs and goats at a farm in the village of Normandy, Surrey. The farm is advertised on the web as a producer and vendor of "free range" pork/bacon, beef/veal, lamb, and mutton products.
Culling of other susceptible species on suspected or confirmed-infected premises does not necessarily mean that these animals have been found infected; possibly, the suspicion involves bovines. Details are expected to be included in UK's follow-up report to the OIE.
All 3 outbreaks so far -- including the new one, which at this stage is regarded as suspected -- are located in the village of Normandy. An additional cattle herd was culled in Elstead, about 7 km south of Normandy, in a 2nd farm property of the owner of the index farm. There are, thus, 2 protection zones.." Read in full
Feeling sickened, we await test results. One wonders if all the susceptible animals have been killed or just the cows.

August 9 ~ EU says restrictions are to stay in place at least until 25 August.

Brussels says that the situation has not yet "stabilised" since culling at a third farm was ordered yesterday afternoon. A European Commission spokesman said it would be "premature" to alter the EU measures and EU vets will gather in Brussels on Thursday 23rd August to assess the situation. See EUobserver
It should be remembered that at this stage we do not know how the virus got into the country around the Pirbright labs and we do not even know which was the index case. We will post the results of the tests on yesterday's culled animals as soon as we can find them.

August 9 ~ Cracked Mirror

A very unpleasant article in the Mirror this morning is an example of how some journalists are tarring all farmers with the same old smear of being heartless and greedy. The Mirror is read by around one and a half million people. Yet again one feels great concern that the decent, hard-working family farmers - those that are hanging on despite terrible economic hardship - are, on top of all their other worries - being reviled as well. An extract from a private email today gives an example of a farmer who can only keep going by working at another part time job as well. And this is common now; (another reason why the RPA situation is so scandalous) :
"...tired - trying to make some hay with very tired equipment and old tractor - nothing 10 or 15 k wouldn't fix quite quickly but.... fed up with farm, fmd, overtime at work to pay for farm eqpt - most days it all seems worthwhile, others -well, lets not dwell on those. Yesterday was one of those.."
Particularly disgraceful in the article was the suggestion that the grief of the Surrey farmers was not genuine. In spite of its evident support for vaccination, we found the whole piece one of the nastiest attempts to deepen the chasm between town and country that we have seen since 2001. As Huw Rowlands, a Cheshire farmer, wrote yesterday, it is time a distinction was made in the public mind between the powerful agri-business interests who are not representative of all farmers and the real farmers who often have no representation at all.

August 8 ~ Of course vaccination should have been the immediate reaction for all susceptible animals considered to be at risk.

The EU FMD vaccine bank contained (and stilll contains?) some 5 million doses of O1 BFS 67 vaccine in the form of highly concentrated inactivated antigen stored over liquid nitrogen. In this case the vaccine has to be formulated and bottled by Merial, which will take a couple of days only. The much respected Hugh Pennington notwithstanding, talk of not using vaccination "yet" or "until things get out of control" may one day be looked back on with utter incomprehension. The CVO in her very brief press conference today did not allow the V-word to pass her lips - and nor was she asked by any of those press who could get a word in. But vaccination should have started at the perimeter of the Surveillance zone and quickly worked inwards. The first round could have been completed on day one. Contemplating the days passing without it is a bitter frustration.
Meanwhile, television shows us shimmering pictures of marksmen with their rifles (humane slaughter or medieval butchery?) walking away away from the infected area still wearing their 'protective' suits. So much for biosecurity.
It is very apparent that DEFRA is being advised and negotiated with by the big players. Their reasons for not wanting vaccination are well known and well described today by the Scotsman - but union leaders know little about infectious disease or what needs to be done to eradicate the disease beyond the crude term "stamping out". Policy is created by a powerful group at DEFRA's shoulder, while DEFRA chooses to interpret good diagnostic information from the Vet labs without using the expertise within these labs for shaping their policy.

August 8 ~ There's more at stake than paying compensation to farmers if Pirbright is found to be responsible for the leak

Part of our very wobbly translation of this Swiss report account from Tagesschau this afternoon is as follows:
"..... Veterinary experts from the 27 Member States of the European Union have met in Brussels to discuss the UK's foot and mouth situation. With EU Commission experts they discussed whether preventative measures should be intensified or eased. Independent British invsetigators ...warned of hasty assumptions. "There is no definitive answer to the question of where the virus came from" - but the likely probablity is that it came from one of two laboratories in Pirbright 60 kilometres from London.
The point whether Pirbright will be able to remain a reference laboratory of the European Union for all FMD work, bluetongue illness and vesicular illnesses, has not yet been discussed. This year the British laboratory has received (the equivalent of ) approximately 773 thousand euros towards its work."
Could we be seeing the end of Pirbright as a World Reference Laboratory? (No wonder everyone in Government circles wants Merial - whose safety report in February was satisfactory - to turn out to have been the party at fault.)
We notice today that New Zealand's director of MAF's investigation and diagnostic centres, Hugh Davies, has said that no foot-and-mouth samples are kept in New Zealand because there are kits which can diagnose the virus in other ways." radionz.co.nz And it may well be that the days of Pirbright's monopoly for FMD diagnosis is drawing to an end anyway.

August 8 ~ Restrictions eased for movement to slaughter and for fallen stock for "certain parts of the country"

We know no more detail at 3.30 pm. It sounds as though farmers may need to go on line to get the general licence but at 3.30 there were no news releases on the DEFRA site for today and nothing we could find about this - although we'd welcome information from those luckier in their searches. It has been disappointing in this crisis that mainstream reporters have often seemed favoured with information before so many people who are directly involved - very many of whom are not the sort of farmers who are represented by the agri-business unions. These unions - and especially the NFU are certainly in the loop if not actually directing the loop's curve. But there are many very anxious tenant farmers, smallholders and animal owners who are not getting official information and are not being consulted. There is a lot of speculation that this movement easing is because DEFRA has suddenly realised that farmers are going to break the regulations out of sheer necessity - so, like the footpath question - they have seen the wisdom of changing a decision that may have been ill advised. However the CVO insisted the change was due to her own veterinary assessment.
UPDATE: Debby Reynolds (with the NFU's Kevin Pearce there too ) has just given a press conference. Eased movements for everywhere outside the two zones. More bad news Slaughter on suspicion , a phrase we'd hoped never to hear again, is about to take place on "an adjacent farm" and " I cannot rule out that disease is developing on the premises." The CVO would not tell reporters any more and could not give any details of the animals that will now die. No mention of any test result for them. She referred people to the website for more information. (Which finally updated with brief notes of today's news at 5.04)

August 8 ~ Allotment is out of the picture

The Merial staff member who accompanied investigators to his allotment is said by a Merial statement to be uninvolved in any leak. There is no evidence at all to link that member of staff to any leak, they say. They add that media attention (and we can all picture what they mean) camped outside the person's house is "unhelpful". So we are left with the following possibilities.
• The wind transfer suggestion has no evidence to support it (The 1981outbreak was that was supposedly windborn was certainly an individual carrying it on the Ferry to the Isle of Wight - not windborne).
• Flood from a storm drain with material not heat inactivated before disposal is possible. - bad lab. practice
• Sabotage : indeed possible -for a variety of possible reasons

August 8 ~ Continued reliance on the NFU as an authority is perverting coverage

When one listens to such broadcasts as this (Sky) on vaccination one has to take a few deep breaths. Hugh Pennington pops up yet again saying that we'd vaccinate if the outbreak got "out of control" - whereas ring vaccination is precisely what prevents this. We are reminded again of Jonathan Miller's exasperation today
"....Another crime scene is the newsrooms of the national media who are blundering about oaf-like on this story. The word "vaccination" was banned from the BBC 6 o'clock national news program yesterday. Sky has a very pretty girl outside Pirbright who knows the square root of fuck all about FMD and would struggle to define or even spell epizootic. Sky has a medical correspondent who seems to be getting around this, but their continued reliance on the NFU as an authority is perverting their coverage and making them look ever more naive and stupid. ..."
It is time that our pundits understood one basic fact at least. That is that an animal that has been vaccinated cannot become a "carrier" (misnomer) unless it has already been be exposed to wild, live FMD virus. That is why vaccination should have begun at once, starting from the outside of the zone and working in. There has been no evidence anywhere of outbreaks having been caused by vaccinated animals acting as "carriers". (I have the authority to say this because I have been working on this subject, unpaid and unswayed by any interest, every single day for the last six years.) No vaccinated animal has ever hampered any FMD eradication efforts anywhere in the world.
As for the general chorus of praise for DEFRA one must just point out that information for local people has been very much lacking, ring vaccination is not being openly and authoritatively debated, information on the infectivity of the strain and its characteristics are woefully lacking, and secrecy seems to pervade the department even now. The usual David King response of waiting for animals to develop symptoms and then killing them has been in evidence ever since Saturday. The NFU appears next to the chief vet at Defra news conferences, and no pronouncement that would not get NFU approval seems ever to be aired except on websites such as this. We hate to say it when we'd had such hopes - but something is still rotten in the state of Defra.

August 8 ~ Culling is solely to protect our beef export industry, whilst supermarkets happily continue importing beef from FMD endemic countries

Huw Rowlands, a Cheshire farmer writes to make the distinction between agri business (represented by the NFU) and the agriculture of family farms firmly based in and contributing to the rural economy.
"....Culling infected animals is intended solely to protect our beef export industry, whilst supermarkets happily continue importing beef from countries such as Brazil, where foot-and-mouth disease is endemic. Can anyone explain the sense in this? And what about the contribution towards climate change of needlessly shipping vast quantities of meat around the globe?.." Read in full

August 8 ~ No punches pulled

The journalist, Jonathan Miller, has an outspoken (and blessedly funny) blog whose illustrations alone are worth a visit. However, he has some pungent remarks today on the opaque nature of the HSE report (which he deconstructs for us), speculation about the desk upon which the buck should finally stop, remarks that we would never have dared to make about the quality of reporting in the mainstream media, and - this is the most worrying of all perhaps - the extraordinary article written by Sir Brian Follett in the Sunday Times. It seems almost incredible that Sir Brian, who heard, in the course of the RS Inquiry, all the most pertinent remarks concerning the 2001 epidemic and was privy to the carefully reasoned arguments of the real scientists, should have written such an article unless pressure was applied. Jonathan Miller says,
".....the suspicion of spin always too close.... I am working on a list of the 10 top things about FMD..... An early candidate for the top most stupid thing is from Sir Brian Follett in The Sunday Times who sagely declares: "the reason we slaughter animals is because, in island countries, it works. We can keep the virus out."
This is pretty delusional, isn't it Sir Brian? "
As for Sir Brian's arguments, they have all been convincingly refuted and we will publish this as soon as we get the green light.

August 8 ~ " I stopped eating my cornflakes and wondered how Catlow would respond.."

On the subject of the Talking Heads wheeled in by the media, Nick Green, the Cumbrian hero of 2001, has just been watching the interview this morning with David Catlow, the BVA vet: "The BBC presenter then asked Catlow, "Why do we conduct the research into FMD vaccine in this country when that is clearly a threat to the local farming community and when we never use the FMD vaccines here in the UK?"
An excellent question. I stopped eating my cornflakes and wondered how Catlow would respond...." Read in full

August 8 ~ Vets and government officials were last night debating whether to start vaccinating

The Guardian reveals that vaccination may be a little closer. This would be emergency vaccination (to live, we hope and assume) of cattle in the exclusion area rather than contiguous culling. (Although we have seen no official report anywhere, the killing of the animals on the smallholding, see below, later showed no virus present.) The Guardian:"The consensus is that vaccination is the most effective way of halting infection if the disease spreads to other areas. This becomes more likely the more outbreaks there are."
If these outbreak really can be isolated, if rapid on-site testing really is finally being used by the government (albeit very quietly), if vaccination is going to be used at last to protect animals and farmers from the utter misery we have seen this week, warmwell can fold its tents and have a rest at last.

August 8 ~ No news is good news

In spite of a rumour that had reached our ears yesterday, there are no reports of new cases anywhere yet. Interest still focuses on how the virus could have escaped. Who actually owns the Pirbright land now seems important, particularly if drains were responsible. If Merial only rents their part then it does look as though legally the IAH - for whom we have a lot of sympathy in view of the way they have been starved of funds - may find itself responsible since Merial has said it does not release water from the shared Pirbright site. "We ensure that the water we use in our virus production is treated. We then transfer it to the IAH who treat it further and release it." (See BBC)
There is speculation too that a worker at the Pirbright site may have released virus into the countryside via his allotment. The map does show a stream passing from the allotments, through the paddock, by the nursery/compost/animal feed farm toward Willey Green and then north toward Pirbright.

August 7/8 2007 ~ A prototype on-site rapid diagnostic machine is being used in Surrey

Extraordinary news. Certainly not generally known. A very impressed Bryn Wayt has sent this email to many contacts. "... a very nice and helpful lady vet and phoned and confirmed that, "a prototype RT-PCR unit had been used on the first IP, and the VO on the second site would be using it." His email is worth reading in full. We feel the manufacturer is irrelevant - as long as rapid test results can be obtained before the long wait for lab confirmation.
As for the question about whether the strain would have been needed in order to test the cattle at Woolfords farm with a portable machine - we are told that it does not matter what sort of FMD virus is involved. One test detects them all. It appears that Pirbright has been doing quite a bit behind the scenes with portable devices. And the very good news is that the whole portable PCR field will be transformed with very cheap machines that are highly automated within the year.
We find this news exciting - but once again, it has to be teased out and we are very grateful indeed both to those who ask the searching questions - and those who give the answers.

August 7/8 ~ Was it Bill or was it Ben?

HSE initial report
".... large scale production at the Merial site (10 000 litres) and a series of small scale experiments (less than 10 millilitres in each case) at the IAH site.....We have initiated further studies intended to provide additional molecular information on the virus types in use at both organisations. ... detailed technical analysis... results are ...expected within a week.
There would have been differences between the viruses used in the two different labs. (Virus for vaccine production is modified compared to the "field virus") With recent technology it should be possible to determine the lab of origin. And the choice of lab to investigate - because of IAH's monopoly - looks likely to be limited to one. Stranger than any fiction is that the key suspect should be the only one able to carry out the forensic investigation. (The HSE have served five notices on the Institute's two labs Pirbright and Compton, for breaching safety rules in the past four years.)

August 7 2007 ~ The two farms' cleansing and disinfection is to be paid for, says Hilary Benn, "due to the exceptional circumstances"

Gordon Brown has been careful to apologise to the farmers and promise help - and to thank everyone for their cooperation. But no word at all on vaccination. No question asked on that. The revised zones can be found at DEFRA's announcement

August 7 2007 ~ HSE initial report statement released - accidental or deliberate human activity suspected

Neither lab has been pinpointed as the culprit but the balance tips towards IAH. Initial report points: Merial and IAH experiments have been mentioned. No evidence that there were breakdowns in the filters. They are still pursuing "lines of enquiry"...pipework and structure. Potential for virus to have escaped via humans, contaminated material might have travelled between the site and the farm. Very much an interim report - They have found no major gap in security. Unfortunately the SKY presenter does not realise that the Merial production of vaccine will not be posing any risk sine no live virus is used in the making of the 300,000 doses of vaccine ordered for possible use. Wind and flooding apparently virtually ruled out. The Sun this morning made rather more definite remarks claiming that decontamination rules were flouted regularly. The presence of builders on the site was not mentioned.
Peter Kendall (NFU) has appeared on television and duly made the expected angry remarks - although Pirbright does not make the bureaucratic difficulties for farmers and one feels a sympathy for the underfunded Institute, once such a hugely respected centre of excellence for foot and mouth.

August 7 ~ The Netherlands order vaccine - and are inspecting every imported animal

www.volkskrant.nl/ (Translation) 6.44 pm " The Dutch minister has ordered 265,000 doses of vaccines. And has asked the Food Safety Authority to stand by for a possible vaccination campaign. It does not however mean that a decision to start vaccinating has been taken."
No signs of FMD have yet been found in the Netherlands, "according to a spokesperson for the Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority. The VWA has been busy since Saturday carrying out checks of livestock at the 150 companies that have been involved in about 380 livestock transports between the Netherlands and Great Britain since the beginning of June. The VWA spokesperson expects that the last inspections will be carried out on Wednesday. The VWA has commissioned veterinarians to carry out the checks. The doctors are examining every animal for symptoms of the disease. They are also taking random blood tests. No symptoms of FMD have been found in the past few days." ( Source. Thanks for this link to FMD News - a service provided by the FMD Surveillance and Modeling Laboratory, University of California at Davis )

August 7 ~ Media concentration on 'who is to blame' and mention of "compensation" is a red herring for decent farmers

There is controlled anger as well as the much mentioned"nervousness". Here is a West Country sheep farmer all too aware of the bitter paradoxes of the non-vaccination policy:
"As a livestock farmer myself, with cattle, sheep and goats on my farm, I am angry to find myself trapped between two contradictory policies relating to FMD.  On the one hand, I am barred by the State from protecting my animals by vaccinating them against this unpleasant but non fatal disease that only affects cloven hoofed animals (not humans).  I am allowed, even encouraged, to vaccinate my animals against a wide range of other diseases.
If my animals contract FMD, this non fatal disease, or if the livestock on a nearby farm are even suspected of having contracted this non fatal disease, they will be killed by DEFRA slaughter men, probably in circumstances far from humane.
My only defence against my animals suffering this fate is to 'exercise bio security measures'; primarily to prevent any contact with my animals from the world outside.  On the other my animals from the world outside.  On the other hand, I am told by the State, that the rural tourist industry is much more valuable than my activities as a livestock farmer; and that consequently I must not prevent persons from the outside from walking along the footpaths through my fields...." Read in full
DEFRA now (6.08 pm) finally announces that footpaths in the immediate area will now be closed off.

August 7 2007 ~ Brigadier Birtwhistle can only cite "consumer confidence" as an argument against vaccination

Regular readers will be sharing our dismay and disillusionment at the recurrence of arguments that were soundly put to rest in 2001, especially in the mouth of the respected Brigadier Birtwhistle on BBC News 24 this evening.He said vaccination would be difficult because consumers would not want to eat vaccinated products. It is simply not true.
Even in 2001, research from Taylor Nelson Sofres (TNS) showed that eight out of ten people in the UK, or 83% to be precise, said that they were not any less likely to consider buying and eating British produced meat as a result of the FMD crisis. That was then. Now we have seen far more good sense spoken about the eating of vaccinated meat - something most of us do all the time. Even Sir John Krebs is an ally here:
"The Food Standards Agency was unambiguous in its view that vaccination would not pose a food safety risk and that, since farm animals are regularly vaccinated against numerous diseases, there was no need to label products. If the industry was correct in assuming that people would not want meat and milk from vaccinated animals, there does seem to me to be a bit of a paradox." Wooldridge Lecture 2003

August 7 2007 ~ "authorities will indeed find it easier to avoid massive stamping-out strategies." Bernard Vallat, Director General of the OIE

Bernard Vallat, Director General of the OIE itself, is in favour of vaccination to treat animal disease. In his Preface to the Rev. sci. tech. Off. int. Epiz., 2002, 21 (3), 417-123 he writes of the OIE's "...recognition of new diagnostic tests capable of distinguishing infected animals from those that have been vaccinated (particularly when emergency ring vaccination is used to prevent the disease from spreading within a country or zone), that can be used for mass epidemiological screening of animal populations.....
The amendments to the FMD chapter in the Code ... provide alternatives to stamping-out without vaccination ....considerably reducing the period of embargo on countries that resort to emergency vaccination but do not slaughter vaccinated animals,
by using the new diagnostic tests on the herds involved, (proving) that the virus is not in circulation, means that authorities will indeed find it easier to avoid massive stamping-out strategies. "
His views - unlike ours - can hardly be discounted. Protection zones have again been extended this afternoon. We, like Director General Vallat, can only hope that there will be enough calm and reasoned arguments to overwhelm the old "cure by killing" mindset, here in the UK. The sight of weeping farmers is something we just cannot bear when the alternatives are so patently there.

August 7 2007 ~ "... the classical scenario to use vaccination successfully without, in the long term, compromising the export status of the whole of the UK."

Email today from a farmer whose experience is extensive both with livestock and with animal health matters. She is also one of the few who has a full grasp of the EU Directive. She, too, has been alarmed by the article in the Farmers Weekly mentioned below in which a vet, rather oddly dubbed "independent", claims he is "adamant the government should still refrain from vaccination". This article will have been highly influential and there were no counter-arguments made. Our correspondent points out:
"The products of vaccinated animals could easily be marketed within the area - and besides saving animals from being destroyed, the risk of transmitting the virus out of the restricted zones could be minimized.
This is still to be considered a localized outbreak and if this outbreak should spread beyond the boundaries of the protection zones it might be only controllable by measures that were already scandalous in 2001. Every additional animal that gets infected enhances the risk and by the time clinical signs are obvious the virus is already on the move to claim the next victim.
The Government should stop listening to useless "consultants" and use vaccination before it is too late.
These are arguments that should be in the public domain - especially for farmers who may be hearing only the views of the anti-vaccination talking heads.

August 7 2007 ~" These cattle do not benefit at all from all the work on FMD vaccines done on their doorstep..."

Anne Bosanquet has sent us the letter she has written to Abigail Woods, following Dr Woods' Guardian article today
Extract of her letter: "....surely the point is, these cattle, in the immediate area under threat of contracting this highly infectious disease, do not benefit at all from all the work on FMD vaccines done on their doorstep. Although they are at risk from escaped pathogens, the vaccines produced here are for the benefit of foreign beasts and not our own. I thought the improvements in the latest FMD vaccines was that tests could now discriminate between infected and vaccinated cattle -so why cannot our own cattle be afforded this protection now?"
Mrs Bosanquet very kindly writes to warmwell: "Part of the reason that vaccination is being contemplated at all, (in the teeth of economic pressures from the usual suspects) is the sheer pressure and reasoned quality of your own website. We all know that what happened last time was absolutely intolerable and that needs to be articulated to politicians again and again and again. If ever there was a case for vaccination it's this one."

August 7 2007 ~ Disposal -best scientific analysis deems it necessary to carry carcases 90 miles on roads?

Dr Iain Anderson, (Lessons Learned report) who opined on BBC 24 today that we were "in very much better shape" than last time, gave it as his view that the "best scientific analysis" must have decided the solution of taking the killed animals 90 miles by public road. He appeared somewhat surprised by the interviewer's suggestion that perhaps it was a political decision to avoid the repetition of easily photographed pyres, recalling the horrors of 2001.
On-farm burial has been asked for in the Protection Zone. It would be reassuring to know that all alternatives have been considered as per Article 3.6.6.6. of the OIE Terrestrial Animal Health Standards Commission (Unofficial version of the Meeting in Paris 2-13 October 2006 Report)
"Decision makers, in addition to biosecurity considerations, need to understand the economic, social and aesthetic impact of various disposal technologies....A disposal option hierarchy may be incapable of fully capturing and systematizing the relevant dimensions at stake, and decision makers may be forced to consider the least preferred means. It therefore requires a comprehensive understanding of any array of dead animal disposal technologies and must reflect a balance between the scientific, economic, and social issues at stake."
(Still no mention of vaccination in the past few hours, no emails or texts are mentioning vaccination, it would seem. No interviews with vaccination experts.)

August 7 2007 ~ Report by Health and Safety on Pirbright due very soon

It has, we understand, been handed to the Ministers concerned (Correction. It was still being compiled at 5.00 pm) - and we wait to hear what its findings are. In spite of some degree of improvement in openness ( as described here) what are described as "the legal and political implications" may, it is feared, prevent details of the findings of the report being made public.
The report has been "delayed" - not altogether unexpected but this delay is "for no particular reason" we were told at about 5.00 pm.
It seems highly unfair to IAH Pirbright to be pre-empting the findings by suggesting in the media how "angry" everyone is likely to be. The Institute has been consistently deprived of funding in recent years - partly because of the RPA debacle. Neither security nor morale can be high in such circumstances. (Like many others, we find it unfortunate that journalists must sell news by finding the most dramatic way of presenting it rather than giving balanced information at such times. The BBC used to be cherished for its fair and balanced reporting.)

August 7 2007 ~ There are 75 farms with 750 cattle, 1,500 sheep and 200 pigs in the Protection Zone - they could all be vaccinated within 24 hours

We are reliably told that it should be possible to get the most-at-risk animals vaccinated within 24 hours using just 3 or 4 vaccination teams.. However, there is no debate on vaccination at the moment on BBC News 24. It may be felt odd, by many readers, that Prof. Pennington, an undoubted expert in his own field, is considered an authority in this field. He has apparently said that they might not have the right vaccine, as it is an imported virus. And to suggest that "we don't know which animals to vaccinate" is bizarre. We are astonished too by the words of "independent vet consultant Tony Andrews" quoted - without challenge- by the usually excellent Farmers' Weekly. The Uruguay experience in 2001 speaks for itself - but that was six years ago and things have moved on even further. Why are the newspapers not asking the real experts with practical experience in the field?
It is unthinkable that this is because no one knowledgeable is talking urgently about it.
It should not be forgotten that the still unlevel playing field rules that make vaccination the poor relation as far as the resumption of exports are concerned (six month wait as opposed to three months without vaccination) apply only to the carefully delineated region that has made use of emergency vaccination. It would not apply to the whole country. Does anyone dispute this? The grief and misery of both farmers involved in Surrey is very real - and the infection of this too is horribly likely to spread unless humane measure are put in place right away.
We really do hope that DEFRA is taking blood samples regularly. In the Netherlands, blood samples of 19,000 animals have already been taken - and of course it goes without saying that this is done responsibly with precautions taken to make sure that any possible virus is not carried to the next clean farm. There are less than 3,000 animals in the most-at-risk area in Surrey.

August 7 2007 ~ Consternation that Trading Standards in the Protection Zone have told farmers they may not close footpaths

Farmers in the Protection Zone immediately around the outbreaks have "begged" Hilary Benn and Gordon Brown to close paths - but according to the landowner, Lawrence Matthews, on whose grazed land the second outbreak has been confirmed told BBC News that there is no sign of closure at all. As he says, we don't even know which is the index case. Chris Huhne told News 24 that both he and Menzies Campbell had asked Gordon Brown on Saturday to close paths. He expressed himself "very concerned".

August 7 2007 ~ ".... if a veterinary risk assessment shows that measures additional to the basic slaughter policy were required...."

One wonders who is giving the veterinary risk assessment here. The line above is taken from the stock reply received by those begging the CVO to begin vaccinating Here. Can the mind-set really still the same as that in 2001? After six long years of patient argument? The case for vaccinating now is so evident - and if it were done properly and swiftly there would be no need for further talk of culling on non-infected premises. Once again, we urge a thorough and patient look at the paper vaccination and transmission which was written by a world expert now at EU FMD.

August 7 2007 ~ "Who would notice the infection in deer? Does DEFRA have a plan?"

An emailer asks some urgent questions about the effect of flooding at the Pirbright site and the likelihood that wild deer will indeed have been exposed to infection. (see also below) He asks what clearly identifiable symptoms they have - or do they, like sheep in 2001, fight off the disease without anyone noticing?
(We understand that clinical disease is mild or inapparent in the red and fallow deer but more severe in the roe deer. The appearance and distribution of the lesions are similar to those in sheep - but see the paper cited below)
"Who does DEFRA expect to inspect wild deer and report symptoms and to whom? What is their plan for containing the spread of FMD in deer?" Like many others, he expresses a wish for far more information to come from DEFRA. Many smaller farmers are starved of news and feel unrepresented - and are anyway are doing vital work on the farm and are far too busy taking advantage of the weather to be glued to the internet (if they even have it).

August 6/7 2007 ~ Not good news. Clinical signs found in another herd.
            NOW will you vaccinate?

Another herd has been identified with clinical signs within the larger protection zone. Debby Reynolds has ordered that the herd be culled as soon as practicable. As an emailer comments , if as many as 39 of the Woolfords cattle really tested positive for disease "it may be that this has rumbled around longer than a week or so. That is not good news, if this small farm is not the index case."
This is the very moment that emergency ring vaccination of all susceptible animals starting from the outside of the surveillance zone should begin. The 67 strain, now designated FMDV-O1 BFS 1860/UK/67, was particularly prone to air-borne spread and could even still be air-borne. (Rounding up the now possibly infected roe deer that roam freely in the Protection Zone and killing them all in a pen would not prove easy, either. Vaccination is now urgent and essential.)
UPDATE: Last night about fifty cows were killed at the second farm. This brings the total already slaughtered to about 150. Samples have been "taken to a laboratory" for testing.
We have had six years to get, validate and refine on-site rapid diagnostic tests. It has not been done. Clinical examination - even where symptoms are apparent - is no substitute for an efficient swift testing of all animals in the protection zone.
On the theory of spread by flooding, a map-reading emailer queries whether the virus could have been carried uphill by flood water...

August 6/7 2007 ~ CNN presenter says Vaccination hides disease -

A CNN World News Europe presenter, in covering the latest news about the FMD outbreak in the UK gave some "background information" about FMD: "the only way to stop an outbreak is by culling. Vaccination is not popular because it hides the disease". Hearing this does rather deprive one of the will to live. .. Unfortunately it is often people who direct public opinion who spout such things with such apparent authority. (Ben Bradshaw too apparently clings to this belief) - yet its repetition cannot make it any less misleading. We can only, yet again, refer to the experts on virology. When a few months ago the Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton also unwisely told the Countess of Mar (Hansard) that vaccination "could spread the disease further and thus be dangerous", Dr Colin Fink wrote
" Mary, As I am sure that you know, this is complete and utter rubbish and shows that all the 'Virologists' invented by Fred Landeg in Page Street, in answer to a question from the Countess of Mar are a myth. DEFRA cannot be allowed to go on peddling this mis-information with such arrogance and insularity. They cannot even advise their representatives properly and know nothing of how vaccines work. You may publish this comment if you wish - I am angry about this."
Read Dr Fink's email in full. It is important that an expert practising virologist's understanding about vaccination is seen. We also refer people again to the very important paper written for warmwell in 2001 on vaccination and transmission

August 6/7 2007 ~ Bio-security was "fairly relaxed"

On the question of what Professor Brian Spratt may discover at Pirbright, this extract from The Dairy Farmer of August 2001 is relevant - if the same situation still exists:
"..... Ex-Pirbright employees visited pubs at weekends, and used farm footpaths, despite a requirement of quarantine after handling viruses. They described bio-security as 'fairly relaxed'. ...
Pirbright was experimenting with FMD virus last year. Three trials were at Level 2, and considered "mainly safe", but also listed was 'Genetic Manipulation of Foot and Mouth disease', (Ref. 53trans/1) at Levels 3 & 4. (Note the Ref numbers were the same for the two projects)
I understand level 4 work is bio-weapons. .... "
while a page that has been on warmwell for five years now adds authority to the extract above.
The Western Morning News (Monday): "It seems ironic that the very institution designed to protect animal health appears to be at the centre of the latest outbreak of foot and mouth disease. We should be concerned that what has until now been seen as a world-class institution could possibly have undermined its own work. .... Brigadier Alex Birtwhistle, who was at the heart of the 2001 FMD epidemic, was right when he said that if the Government didn't get to the heart of the problem promptly 'the country will never forgive them twice'."

August 6 2007 ~ As part of Defra's contingency plan and in order to ensure full preparedness, 300,000 doses of strain-specific vaccine have been ordered from the UK's vaccine bank, to be made up from antigen. No decision has been taken on whether or not to use the vaccine.

The Defra website gives Key points set out by Debby Reynolds Vaccination teams are to move into the area but the CVO stresses that " this is not an indication that a decision has been taken to vaccinate. It has not."
Professor Brian Spratt will begin his review into biosecurity arrangements at the Pirbright site tomorrow. Included in the evidence will be the outcome of the immediate investigation currently being carried out by officials from the HSE, Defra, and the Veterinary Medicines Directorate. Production of vaccine will be carried out at the Merial laboratory "..obviously we would not be doing this without careful consideration and assessment of the risks. Producing vaccine from antigen does not involve use of live virus."

August 6 2007 ~" I am so fed up with the B...idiots who sent the FMD carcasses by road, 90 miles, when the rest of us have been told no movement."

"Somehow they don't associate risk of spread with driving 90 miles through farmland with livestock in the fields." This comment has just arrived and will, no doubt, be being echoed up and down the country - particularly along the 90 mile route from Elstead to Frome. (The Farmers' Guardian report by Alastair Driver confirmed today that the slaughtered cows had indeed been sent off to the Wessex Incineration plant, at Frome. ) Another FG report today tells us that despite varying reports on the minimum length of time the movement restrictions will be in place - no timeframe has been put in place for any lifting of them.

August 6 2007 ~ "Because the animals were infected with the very vaccine strain itself, the vaccine should be the absolute perfect match."

icWales (link mended, apologies) quotes Dr Ruth Watkins speaking today outside the Pirbright laboratory
"..Because the animals were infected with the very vaccine strain itself, the vaccine should be the absolute perfect match. The vaccine should work as well or better than any could work."
She said vaccination is "very important", and works as well as culling.
"I think the world was disgusted with us last time to see us kill so many animals and incinerate them (vaccination) is a way of controlling the infection and eliminating it while minimising the number of animals that have to be culled." And "If you get to economics it must be cheaper," she added.

August 6 2007 ~ 104 redundancies since 2005 - " a risk that we will lose critical expertise"

(Correction: This may have been misleading. The 104 redundancies were in the IAH as a whole, so this presumably included Compton and Edinburgh - but the cuts are no less damaging for that)
"Year on year, we are able to do less science or we are able to employ less people and this is an area of work that spans from foot an"d mouth through to bluetongue virus, ....We are forced to look at this whole of our activity to see where we can juggle the research, so there is a risk that we will lose critical expertise. ..." Professor Martin Shirley of Pirbright.
In November last year, Professor Shirley was answering questions about the effect of the cuts at the Institute. Thanks again to Jo Rider who draws our attention to this extract from the Research Council Institute's Fourth Report.

August 6 2007 ~ Still much to be revealed on virus escape

Although both Merial and Pirbright have been very definite in their horrified denials of possible breaches of security, such an escape is , as we say below, not unprecedented. A ProMed moderator in the Aug 3 posting (and an informed reader was able to give detail) recalled the 1960 virus escape from Pirbright which was the presumed cause of FMD infection on a farm one mile from Pirbright.
"Following this incident, disease security measures were improved and air filtration was introduced to the isolation units." (Source: Animal Health, A Centenary 1865-1965, pp 149-150.)
Rumour has also reached warmwell of air conditioning/bio security breakdowns at Merial - we think in late June this year. Depending on the ambient temperature of the facility, any 'escaped' spores would plume if it was colder outside, and could then blow miles in the wind. Anxiety remains. As for the presence of builders at the Pirbright site, Dr Paul Sutmoller, chair Animal Health Committee, ELA - European Livestock Association, has just sent us the following:
"If I remember well, the last bio-security break at Plum Island, infecting cattle in the holding area outside the laboratory occurred during a period of major constructions going on at the main laboratory. Jack Hyde may be able to comment."

August 6 ~ Fallen stock

Again, thanks to the NPA website and Pat Gardner's ever eagle eyes. This is their advice to pig producers in the light of the movement restrictions
"NPA will continue to press for burial rather than fallen stock collection. In the meantime:
• If you can delay a collection, if only until Tuesday or Wednesday, please do. The issue may be clearer by then.
• If you have someone who can pick up from an off-site collection area, this may not pose much risk - but the decision is yours.
• Don't allow collection if the collector has to come on the farm. Make whatever disposal arrangements you deem most sensible given the current need for the best possible biosecurity.

August 6 ~ Start date 29/07/2007? The Saturday before the Thursday?

There is at last a report on the OIE site Debby Reynolds has apparently reported that the "Start date" was 29/07/2007. The 29th of July? But that was the Saturday before the Thursday evening when "symptoms were reported to the local Animal Health office". Is this a mistake - or were symptoms actually noticed five days earlier? It matters.
(Update. It has been suggested that the "start date" could be an estimate based on the assumed age of the lesions. The BBC today reports that "an investigation of the cuts on the mouths of the cows suggested that they were infected sometime between 18 and 22 July")

August 6 ~ "We need to know much, much more about Pirbright."

The journalist Jonathan Miller, much in justifiably pugnacious evidence in 2001: "... If the questions are being asked at all, they are not being answered in public. .... It seems clear there were warnings - ignored - of an inherently unsatisfactory biosecurity environment. There seem to me also some commercial questions to consider ..... What exactly are these relationships? All these contracts are doubtless marked "commercially confidential". They will not want us to know....." Read in full
And an email just arrived about the cuts in funding at Pirbright suggests that builders are - or were -working on the main laboratory complex. . One wonders if they too were asked to follow rules about showering and having no contact of any kind with susceptible animals for 3/5 days.
UPDATE: We have received the following from Dr Paul Sutmoller: "If I remember well, the last bio-security break at Plum Island, infecting cattle in the holding area outside the laboratory occurred during a period of major constructions going on at the main laboratory. Jack Hyde may be able to comment. Dr Paul Sutmoller, chair Animal Health Committee, ELA - European Livestock Association"

August 6 2007 ~ "The UBI peptide-based vaccine/diagnostic system will be particularly attractive to FMD-free countries for defensive serosurveillance and for contingency plans for emergency vaccination in the event of an outbreak."

Pirbright/Merial are not alone, of course, in producing vaccines. UBI's most advanced foot and mouth vaccine for pigs is described as having "clear-cut distinction of vaccinated from unvaccinated animals (VPI tests) and clear differentiation of vaccinated from convalescent animals". Moreover, they claim "absolute safety from biohazard risk, both during manufacture and use." (See UBI site) A similar vaccine for cattle is also under development.
Intervet too produces modern inactivated FMD vaccines for cattle, buffalo, pigs, sheep and goats. Their vaccines of sufficient potency start to generate the first degree of protection after 2-3 days. More information - and useful, simply-expressed technical explanation is available from various pages on the Intervet website.
We were concerned to hear that David Drew, Vice Chairman, no less, of the EFRA Select Committee was heard saying on Radio Gloucester that FMD vaccines "needed to be developed". Perhaps he was misreported but it hardly helps to give the impression that there are not already highly developed vaccines. Even those vaccines available in 2001 successfully eradicated in Uruguay an epidemic as extensive as our own when just vaccinating cattle alone led to the extinction of virus spread.
UBI says "This growing worldwide market for FMD vaccines gives our peptide-based product potential blockbuster status" . (The suspicion is inescapable that 'potential blockbuster status' may be so coveted by UK commercial hunger that postponing UK FMD vaccination - even at a time of crisis - seems preferable to making use of a rival product.)

August 6 2007 ~ Did they shower? Did they ignore 3 or 5 day ruling?

Within minutes of each other, two separate warmwell readers raise queries about the possibility that stringent security rules may have been ignored - or not enforced - at the Pirbright site. Email forum latest. "Surely, if it is dangerous for one of them to visit a farm within 5 days, wouldn't it also be dangerous to mingle with local farmers at a pub, or in a shop?...."

August 6 2007 ~ " the case for a humane, civilised and scientifically sound policy has strengthened over the past few years to the point where it is beginning to look unassailable"

Magnus Linklater has kindly sent warmwell his article written for today's Times. He looks back shudderingly to six years ago when the "farming establishment closed ranks against any suggestion that there might be a more humane approach." On the question of vaccination, many readers will share our reaction to this gem:
" I remember asking the government's chief scientist, Sir David King, to explain to me why it was not being considered. "I would need five hours to explain the science to you," he said. "Unfortunately I don't have that time." ...."
But, " Let us not go back there, however. The fact is that there has been, since then, a sea change in attitudes within the Department ....the realisation that the science on which so many of those decisions in 2001 were based, was less sound than we were told..
..Again, there is no point in going back into that debate. What is important now is to record how far science has advanced in the meantime. There are accepted tests which can distinguish between infected and vaccinated animals....We know, too, that FMD "carriers" do not infect other animals... "pen-side" tests .. allow a vet to carry out on-the-spot checks to determine whether a herd of cattle or a flock of sheep have been infected, rather than having to send samples back to a laboratory. Rapid diagnosis of this kind means that biosecurity measures can be imposed immediately rather having to wait for the results of tests.
... vaccination can begin within that area as soon as it is available ...
.... I cannot, hand on heart, say that the battle for the vaccine has been won. There are still those in Defra and elsewhere, who will argue for slaughter as the only effective response to this disease. But the case for a humane, civilised and scientifically sound policy has strengthened over the past few years to the point where it is beginning to look unassailable..." Read in full (or on Times website)

August 6 2007 ~ "Good that the Chair took soundings from different sectors. Less good was their reluctance to elucidate clearly the position re vaccination and on-site diagnostic testing..."

Comment from a first hand report to warmwell from a key stakeholder who takes part in the telephone conferencing that has been going on behind the scenes. He spoke of a "far greater degree of openness and transparency" and is relieved that a formally constituted Expert Group (as opposed to an informal coincidental meeting of acquaintances) has minuted meetings available for public scrutiny - "all in large part due to the campaigning efforts of people who are likely to be reading this, whether in the UK, Brussels or further afield.." He adds that questions do remain unanswered, for example
1. "Where it started (ok probably Merial) or when.
2. How far it has spread by wind, water, fomites, wildlife etc
3. Whether it was an accidental escape or other - if other, then where else?
4. Vaccine efficacy presently unknown - as this has come from a vaccine escape, precisely what will best work against it? If a vaccine is used will NSP testing still be possible? If a suitable match can be found, how much of it is there?"
He commented that we are heading towards the autumn at the end of a generally very wet summer - a bad time for the disease to strike. We may be in for a long haul; encouraging noises should be regarded with some scepticism - in 2001 everything was rosy until it wasn't... However, he felt that DEFRA was to be congratulated on their speedy and appropriate responses to date. "However, these may be early days...."

August 6 2007 ~ What is the difference between surveillance and protection zones

Emails from the public now include a question from a concerned and supportive dairy farmer in the US about the difference between surveillance and protection zones. We reply that DEFRA's definition is that a "Protection Zone extends for at least 3km around the infected premises and a Surveillance Zone extends for at least 10 km around the infected premises. Within the Protection Zone all premises containing livestock will be inspected by veterinary inspectors and will be subject to restrictions. This reduces the chance of potentially infected material leaving the premises until the disease status can be determined. Within the Surveillance Zone all premises containing livestock will be subject to movement restrictions."

August 6 2007 ~ 39 animals only found positive so far. Contiguous culling instead of buffer zone vaccination is taking place

At least 80 uninfected animals have been killed. The questions being asked everywhere - about vaccination and about why contiguous culling is already going on - do not seem to be getting clear answers. Why no buffer zone vaccination? The strain is known. Appropriate vaccine has - we assume - been produced at Merial since only the Pirbright site can be the source of the strain having escaped. Creating a buffer zone - as advised by David Holden and the Soil Association, for example (see also Peter Melchett in today's Guardian - seems the obvious and urgent thing to have done as soon as the strain was known. We are not hearing in the media any valid reasons for not doing so. Again and again we hear that emergency vaccination is being "considered". Brian Follett, interviewed on Saturday morning, said that the most important thing is "to do everything we can to stop it turning into a epidemic" and that knowing the strain was very important for a vaccination to live policy Many will be wondering why "everything we can" has not yet included vaccination since we now know only too well what the strain is.
In the Farming Today interview with Debby Reynolds this morning we heard the good news that there are no new cases reported at present. The main thrust of the programme was to report the denials by both Merial and IAH Pirbright that the virus could have escaped because of any breach of security. Hardly the most burning question for farmers, one would have thought. Choosing not to vaccinate is a gamble. The public ought to be being told the economic and trade reasons why - even this time - pre-emptive contiguous culling is happening. Test results - that have to travel to the lab instead of being done on-site - are looked at only after the cattle are dead. Vaccination followed by differential tests would avoid this. We would again appreciate informed comment.

August 6 2007 ~"It doesn't take a conspiracy theorist to note that terrorists of various sorts would be quick to try to take advantage of any faults or lapses in standards "

From a Leading Article in today's Independent "..... The investigations that Hilary Benn, the Secretary of State for Rural Affairs, has ordered into conditions at Pirbright and Merial will, we hope, establish whether the virus escaped from one or the other laboratory and if so, how. Possibly they will conclude that it was a freakish accident. But if they uncover lapses, the Government must act quickly to ensure that levels of biosecurity in these establishments are upgraded, and that uniform high standards are seen to prevail throughout the public and private sector. It doesn't take a conspiracy theorist to note that terrorists of various sorts would be quick to try to take advantage of any faults or lapses in standards in this field.
Updating these facilities may take extra investment from the Government as well as from the commercial sector. So be it.."

August 5 2007 ~ This strain shows clinical signs quickly

Latest information - not from DEFRA but from the NPA site again, following a conference call to "key stakeholders" by Hilary Benn . Extract: "01 BFS67-like virus is virulent. It has an incubation period of two to 14 days. So if any more animals are infected the clinical signs should show very soon after infection" and "Scotland has introduced a derogation allowing livestock keepers to bury fallen stock during the current crisis. NPA has urged Defra today to introduce a derogation where necessary in England......Ian Campbell told Hilary Benn today that fallen stock collection poses an unacceptable risk, but in this hot weather fallen stock will have to be disposed of quickly."

August 5 2007 ~ "Who is actually deciding what happens?"

An email from a worried reader who evidently remembers the 1967 outbreak asks the pertinent question; "Who is actually deciding what happens?" and is confused by what seem to be conflicting media reports about vaccination and who decides. Our tentative answer can be seen here- but we welcome further informed comment.

August 5 2007 ~ New on DEFRA

There is now an amended Declaration and new amoeba-shaped map with its second nucleus to take in Pirbright - "making a new Protection Zone and extending the Surveillance Zone. The previous declaration (made at 22.00 last night) also remains in force." A news release tells us that at Woolfords farm the killing was completed yesterday. 38 of the unfortunate cattle are described as infected, and of the cattle killed on the 2 additional sites of Woolfords Farm, one gave a positive result. The release gives news of the other animals we reported yesterday as having been killed as 'dangerous contacts'
The language of the Declaration seems unfortunate - something we have mentioned before. Instead of offering clarity and support, the tone is officious: "Failure to comply with this Declaration may be an offence under section 72 or 73 of the Animal Health Act 1981". As many of us are all too aware, sections 72 and 73 of the revised Animal Health Act threaten " imprisonment for any term not exceeding 2 months" for failure to cooperate with any one deemed by DEFRA to be an "official". Rather grim. We shall be shortly posting up what you are now compelled to do if the worst happens on your farm.

August 5 2007 ~ "Competence means more than ministerial dashes and urgent meetings..lessons also include being ready to vaccinate"

A leading article in the Sunday Times: "The inquiry that followed the 2001 outbreak, chaired by Dr Iain Anderson, catalogued the government's lack of preparedness and eventual panic. Those lessons include some of the measures that have already been taken: an immediate restriction on animal movements and the closure of events where the disease could be passed on. They also include being ready to vaccinate to prevent the spread of the disease, whatever the residual objections from the farm lobby.
Farming is a tiny part of Britain's economy, just 1%. We should nurture our farmers ..."

August 5 2007 ~ Confusion about the virus strain

A strain called "O1/BFS 1860/UK/67" - which appears to be an amalgam of the two names we have heard from The DEFRA site and the IAH site that links to it - appears on this 2005 Molecular Epidemiology Report Form from Pirbright. Is this then the strain of the virus that caused the 1967 outbreak in the UK? Or is it that the 67 virus is used for comparison? Can anyone enlighten us?
UPDATE: The FMD virus which caused the 1967-8 outbreak in the UK was designated FMDV-O1 BFS 1860/UK/67; its detailed sequencing data and references are available in the table "Foot-and-Mouth Disease Virus O" at IAH's website www.iah.bbsrc.ac.uk

August 5 2007 ~ "What is the function of a World Reference Laboratory... if not to advance the detection of virus infection and management of FMD epidemics?"

. The closeness - in all senses of the word - between Merial and Pirbright has suddenly been thrust into the light of day. In her Submission to the Royal Society of Edinburgh FMD EnquiryDr Ruth Watkins said, " Though funding may have delimited the equipment at Pirbright, the failure to modernise is likely to arise from the outlook in the laboratory- Pirbright has an unchallenged monopoly on FMD work in both research and diagnosis in Britain.....The normal role of a reference laboratory is to provide control materials and facilitate the setting up of routine screening and diagnostic tests in other laboratories..another important role is the validation of diagnostic tests including commercial tests and publishing the results with the collaboration of the commercial companies.
Pirbright has confined itself to in-house tests, producing the materials and developing its own protocols. It has refused to undertake validation of commercial FMD tests ..... There is no other laboratory in Britain that is allowed or could undertake to validate FMD tests.."
If Pirbright - once a public service laboratory - has been forced by its financial strait-jacket into throwing in its commercial lot with Merial this raises questions about unfair competition and the suppression of other technologies and products that could be of enormous value in UK disease control. We should welcome comments.

August 5 2007 ~ Pirbright: "... limited use of the strain at the Institute in recent weeks."

At a press conference IAH director Martin Shirley said that "...there had also been limited use of the strain at the institute in recent weeks." (BBC)
A correspondent notes that IAH conducted an experiment in 2003 where the O1 BFS 1860 strain was inoculated into 4 Standard Compton steers. This strain, he points out, is that identified by the IAH as the exact strain responsible for the Surrey outbreak.
After giving the reference for the experiment he asks, "Could this kind of experimentation be classified as "limited use"? He adds, "Unfortunately this kind of question hasn't been asked yet.."

August 5 2007 ~ Accidents Happen - Security Breaches at Biocontainment Facilities

There have been documented instances of escaping dangerous pathogens in the past few years. One remembers too the May 2001 prosecution of Imperial College (home of Prof. Roy Anderson) for its lapses in safety precautions while dealing with a modified Hepatitis C virus. Even the most "secure" biocontainment may not be as secure as all that. It is easy for complacency to creep in - and when funding is cut by those who do not understand the risks, people of lesser calibre have to be promoted to responsible positions. Low morale and sloppy procedures can easily be the result. How ironic then that, when in 2001 Dr Colin Fink offered his molecular diagnostic systems to help relieve pressure on government labs, DEFRA and the VLA refused to supply his team with the non-infectious FMD material needed to calibrate his assay. The excuse was that FMD was a Category 4 organism and therefore only to handled in absolutely bio-secure facilities. . In fact, as Dr Fink points out in a recent letter to warmwell, he did not need any infectious virus. "...this was nonsense. Once the RNA is extracted the organism has no infectious risk....The confusion was because of out-moded thinking aligning a risk in growing up organisms within the laboratory with that wrongly perceived to be similar in molecular diagnostics..."
It was a lost opportunity for rapid diagnosis during the outbreak - and the irony of yesterday's news will not have escaped those whose who felt such frustration at the time.

August 5 2007 ~ Humane slaughter?

In 2001 there were scenes of slaughter that made the farmer's grief - already terrible in many cases - far worse. Incidences of chaos and stress during the gathering, penning, and slaughter of animals are disturbing. There was 'barbaric conduct [which] was a disgrace to humanity', as one of the EU inquiries has been told (Carnage by Computer: The Blackboard Economics of the 2001 foot and mouth epidemic by Professors David Campbell and Robert Lee)
That was then; this is now - but the Hendersons in Brecon are not the only people to have wondered about the slaughter of the 64 cattle at Woolford Farm. "....as far as I can work it out, that they could have been killed is to be shot at by people standing outside the pen....surely that does not constitute humane slaughter?"
The public is right to be concerned and want to be reassured that the Terrestrial Animal Health Code - 2006 guidelines (Appendix 3.7.6. Guidelines for the killing of animals for disease control purposes) really are are being followed to the letter.

August 5 2007 ~ Lawrence Wright notices an anomaly

A West country sheepfarmer makes a startling point - and one that we had noticed only subconsciously. See emails sent to warmwell.

August 5 2007 ~ Deer do not obey movement bans - and roe deer move between Pirbright and local farms.

"Roe deer occur widely on Surrey's commons, and were even recorded on quite small sites in relatively built-up areas": (DEFRA funded wildlife project pdf) . The A31, inside the 3km exclusion zone, had to be disinfected yesterday because a deer was hit by a car. Woolford farm is separated from Pirbright by an arable farm, a wood and a golf course. It does not take much imagination to predict that any escape of the O1 BFS 1860 virus from IAH Pirbright or the Merial laboratory could now be infecting these deer.
In their paper "Foot-and-Mouth Disease in Deer: implications for the policy of control and eradication of the disease" Paul Sutmoller and Paul Gibbs suggest that if deer are infected then
" all livestock in the area should be vaccinated or re-vaccinated, preferably within three months to obtain an optimum population immunity. Re-population of the area with vaccinated livestock does not need to wait for the infection to peter out in deer. d) The official opinion that FMD infected roe deer constitute a low risk, because sick animals hide and probably die, is not valid. Like cattle or sheep, susceptible deer are very infectious prior to the development of lesions while they still actively move and graze. Also deer with sub-clinical or minor lesions will still roam around."
In considering their next move it is to be hoped that the relevant authorites are aware of such expert advice. This paper too, written for warmwell during the last outbreak by a scientist who soon afterwards rose to a high position in the FAO, should be essential reading for those who want to know the real facts about vaccination and transmission of virus.

August 4 2007 10.26 p.m. ~ It is a vaccine strain 01 BFS 67 (Correction:it is in fact O1 BFS 1860) - one that was being used at Pirbright in July

Professor Hugh Pennington interviewed on BBC News 24 gives as his opinion that the source virus is identical to that in vaccine work being done at Pirbright and very possibly excaped from there. The latest statement by DEFRA :
"The FMD strain found in Surrey is not one currently known to be recently found in animals. It is most similar to strains used in international diagnostic laboratories and in vaccine production, including at the Pirbright site shared by the Institute of Animal Health (IAH) and Merial Animal Health Ltd, a pharmaceutical company. The present indications are that this strain is a 01 BFS67 - like virus, isolated in the 1967 Foot and Mouth Disease outbreak in Great Britain.
This strain is present at the IAH and was used in a batch manufactured in July 2007 by the Merial facility. On a precautionary basis Merial has agreed to voluntarily halt vaccine production.
In response to this new information Debby Reynolds, Chief Veterinary Officer has instructed that a new single Protection Zone be created encompassing both the infected farm premises and the Pirbright site, with a single 10km radius Surveillance Zone. ..." DEFRA site
This does rather appear to want to point the finger at Merial (see below) rather than the Government Laboratory at Pirbright as the source of the leak. ( We can only hope that this extraordinary news may allow farmers further afield to breathe a little more easily - but this is little comfort for those directly affected by what looks like an embarrassing lapse of security.)

August 4 2007 9.45 p.m. ~ "no plans for contiguous culling at present but any dangerous contacts will be dealt with robustly". Pigs, sheep and goats on an adjacent smallholding have been slaughtered as "dangerous contacts"

There is still no more news on the DEFRA site. However, NPA's Digby Scott on the news page of the NPA website: ".....NPA, BPEX and Defra will be helping me communicate all the available news that might be of use to the pig sector.
"....The infection in the beef herd at the centre of the alert is almost certainly recent. The last movement onto the farm was in early July and the last movement off was on July 10 when two animals went for slaughter....Pigs may be implicated. Next to the farm - divided only by a barbed wire fence - is a smallholding with sheep, goats and pigs. These animals have been killed as dangerous contacts...Defra is keen to free up movement when it is sensible. If no further infection is found it is possible some movements under licence will be allowed from Tuesday or Wednesday...
..There are no plans for contiguous culling at present but any dangerous contacts will be dealt with robustly."
(While we are grateful for this to the NPA, who are evidently privy to DEFRA's latest news, we do feel concern for the smallholders and others who appear to have no official source of information at this nerve-racking time. We now know that there was no FMD found on these "dangerous contact" animals on the smallholding and they were killed purely as a "precaution". Whether this was necessary or not is perhaps a matter of opinion.)

August 4 2007 9.20 p.m. ~ Intervet UK: " If requested, we will provide the government with any necessary assistance to bring the outbreak under control."

A link provided by FMD News - a service provided by the FMD Surveillance and Modeling Laboratory, University of California at Davis is this from United Business Media.
Jim Hungerford, General Manager at Intervet UK, comments on the foot and mouth outbreak in Surrey: "We support the government's rapid response and hope that this prompt action will quickly quell the current outbreak. Defra has acted swiftly in identifying the disease and establishing the required restrictions, which will help to prevent any further spread of the virus. If requested, we will provide the government with any necessary assistance to bring the outbreak under control... we believe vaccination should be used if the outbreak develops further."
(It may be remembered that Jim Henderson very kindly answered warmwell's questions about bird flu vaccines a short while ago.)

August 4 2007 (5.50 pm) ~ " I must say, interviewing the chief vet I had a distinct sense of deja vu.." - Snowmail

" In 2001, they all started off telling us it was too soon to vaccinate. Then after a few days they told us it was too late. They claim the same won't happen again..." Krishnan Guru-Murthy