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Livestock disease traced to restaurantBy WASHINGTON POST © St. Petersburg Times, published March 28, 2001 LONDON -- A team of detectives has concluded that the source of the disastrous outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in British livestock may have been an illegal shipment of tainted meat, possibly from East Asia. Britain's Agriculture Secretary Nick Brown told Parliament on Tuesday that some of the infected meat may have ended up in garbage that was later fed to pigs in northern England. From the pigs, the highly contagious virus passed to seven nearby sheep. Thus began an epidemic that has now struck at least four European countries. The Agriculture Ministry's tentative explanation of the outbreak demonstrates how difficult it can be for nations to maintain animal health in an era of global food markets. Foot-and-mouth had not been seen in Europe for 20 years before the outbreak began in mid-February. Detectives surmise that a small pig farm at Heddon-on-Wall, England, just south of the Scottish border, bought garbage from a restaurant as animal feed. This may have been a Chinese restaurant using uncertified meat smuggled from East Asia. Brown said he has banned the use of "pig swill" -- that is, feed made from boiled garbage. But he emphasized that the main issue now is for the government to get control of a blight that seems to be going from bad to worse. The disease has spread to some 700 farms in Britain and a scattering of sites in Ireland, the Netherlands and France. The four governments have ordered the slaughter of more than a half-million animals to stop the spread. Foot-and-mouth disease does not cause human health problems; rather, it is an economic plague for farmers. Pigs, sheep and cows that break out with the characteristic blisters on hooves and lips do not give milk or gain weight, so livestock farmers can't make a profit. The standard way to treat an outbreak is to isolate and slaughter any animals exposed to the virus. Responding to complaints from farmers who have been ordered to slaughter healthy animals as a "firebreak" strategy, Prime Minister Tony Blair said Tuesday he may soon authorize vaccination rather than killing of uninfected herds.
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From the Times wire desk
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