Foot and Mouth Disease Update 3

23 March 2001 

Abandon mass slaughter - NOW 

As the foot and mouth epidemic rushes towards the 500-outbreak level, with dire warnings of the disease lasting until well into August - with cases rising to 4,000 in June - a vital piece of information seems to have been buried in the torrent of media coverage. 

This is the startling revelation from Mr Hugues Inizan. He is the French stock dealer who sent sheep from south Wales to France on 31 January, which were subsequently found antibody positive for FMD by the French authorities. 

Inizan's evidence is an extremely powerful indicator that the current epidemic started not in early February, as is officially held, but in early January. Other unconfirmed but convincing reports put the date earlier, closer to mid-December or even early December. 

Either way, even the very best-case scenario strongly suggests that the epidemic was under-way a full month before the Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food started to take control measures. The implications of this are profound and go to the heart of the present failures to control the epidemic. 

Essentially, the primary control strategy is based on three principles: early identification, isolation and slaughter, all in an attempt to eradicate the disease before it spreads. Logically, and essentially, the success of any such strategy depends of the early identification of the disease before it has spread and, therefore, if the disease has already spread, this calls into question the whole basis of the strategy. 

In fact, the disease had spread out of control before the control measures were underway - that is evidenced by the large number of new cases being reported, their wide geographical spread, the multi-species distribution and the projections for further cases. The Inizan report explains why this has happened - the disease had already "slipped its leash" before the control measures started. 

Given that this is the case, it is now necessary to re-examine the basis of the current control strategy, in which context it is also necessary to review the fundamentals of epidemic dynamics in relation to the current crisis. 

Basically, the epidemic has passed through two of three phases. Phase one involved the occurrence of outbreaks confined to one region, geographically confined, with little or no secondary spread. In this phase, the policy of isolate and slaughter would have been perfectly valid. 

In the second phase, significant secondary infection occurred. There have been outcrops of disease in a number of geographical areas and a rapidly growing case load. It is indeed very clear that we are now in phase two. 

Phase three is where the disease breaks out and becomes completely uncontained, affecting all species: pigs, cattle and sheep. The fear is that, at the moment, the disease is largely confined to sheep, with winter-housed cattle being largely protected. However, from two weeks and progressively onwards, cattle will be turned out to grazing where they will become vulnerable to the disease and we could expect tertiary spread to these animals, leading to an explosive outbreak, larger than we have so far experienced. 

Now, in terms of control strategies, it is very clear that, while we are in a phase two situation, the government is still in the main adopting a phase one control strategy. If this current ethos continues, the only response is to widen the control areas and progressively kill more and more animals. 

However, this strategy is likely to be self-defeating on two grounds. Firstly, as the reservoir of infection grows, and the control areas expand, the sheer scale of the killing necessary will outstrip the resources available to deal with it. There is very good evidence that this is already the case. 

Secondly, the whole case for the eradication strategy is economic - it attempts to restore disease-free status in order to protect our export trade, and to prevent loss in productivity which accompanies endemic status where sporadic outcrops of disease are experienced. 

However, in assessing the viability of the strategy, one must be conscious of the fact that losses per annum are in the order of £1.2 billion whereas, since 19th February, the epidemic has cost over £9bn with costs escalating every day. If the economic cut-off has not already been reached, it can only be a matter of a short time before it does. 

On that basis, recognising that we are in phase two of the epidemic - and the priorities now are to prevent development to phase three, and to minimise losses. In this context, "plan A" - of ever-escalating slaughter, is hardly a viable option. We need a "plan B". 

As to this alternative, various estimates indicated that - in the major sheep-rearing areas - infection rates are up to 80 percent. Most of the animals have already had the disease - which is relatively mild in sheep - and a level of herd immunity has been built up. Slaughter of these animals, far from assisting control, will in fact aid spread, by reducing her immunity by leaving only unaffected animals. Therefore, the obvious strategy here is to abandon sheep slaughter - expect in individual cases on welfare grounds, where animals are in distress. 

So far, except in the early stages of the epidemic, there was little involvement of pigs and, since most pigs are intensively reared, there are largely protected, given adequate biosecurity measures. Therefore, the obvious strategy here is to maintain biosecurity but to kill out where disease strikes. 

For cattle, the situation should be different. Here, with limited numbers - compared with sheep and cattle - there should be a rapid vaccination programme to protect vulnerable animals. On previously infected farms, re-stocking with vaccinated stock should be permitted. 

Where outbreaks occur, whole herd slaughter policy should be abandoned, with selective culling on welfare grounds only, leaving survivors with acquired immunity. There is then some value in "ring-fencing" uninfected areas with a band of vaccination of all species, where blood testing reveals no acquired immunity. 

Given a rise in naturally acquired immunity - through exposure to the disease - and artificially acquired immunity from vaccination, overall "herd immunity" will then arise to a level where the epidemic will peter out and we will be left with a rump of sporadic cases. These can be culled, allowing the disease to die out naturally within ten years. 

There is no doubt that this strategy would enable the countryside to return to normal very rapidly, and reduce substantially the economic losses. There is no need for the continuation of mass slaughter. 

ends 

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