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Bluetongue in Europe

When you listen to some reports you would think that Bluetongue was rampant in France and that the knacker men were rushed off their feet. To date there have been 272 outbreaks detected by surveillance activities, with only 12 reports of clinical disease in animals (cattle, sheep or goats). Under the French national surveillance programme, nearly 40,000 cattle on over 1,300 farms were tested in September and October 2015. This continues to support the evidence that BTV-8 presents with few clinical signs in cattle. The “seasonally free zone” status of several regions has now been lifted as vector activity has increased or as cases are detected. Clearly the infection has over wintered and vaccination is too limited in France to prevent spread in 2016.The UK does not have agreement with France to accept unvaccinated animals under any sort of bilateral agreement from seasonally free zones. Italy has reported four outbreaks of BTV-1 and one of BTV-4, in cattle in various regions. Disease control measures are in place, including vaccination. The Portuguese authorities have somewhat belatedly reported 10 outbreaks of BTV-1 which occurred in the south of the country in December 2015.

Concerns in England

It would seem to me that although different strains of the virus are active in Europe mainly the disease is found unknown to their keepers when blood samples are taken. The serological survey was taken at the end of last year when the disease had not spread to the Channel Coast of France. Blue Tongue is spread by midges and it needs to get to the North of France before there is a possibility of it getting here. At the moment the weather conditions are not favourable for that to happen and the temperatures are not high enough for it to spread very far should it eventually get here. I understand that the BTV-8 vaccine will be available here again later in the summer, but I cannot see the need to use it here in Shropshire at the moment.

On Going Surveillance

The Animal and Plant Health Agency are still keen to send out reports and produce charts to keep us all updated as to what they are doing. These are not easy to interpret but the latest ones I have seen seem to imply that in some areas the submission of carcasses for post mortem examination is down by as much as 80% .I know it was a mild winter, but higher temperatures can still cause problems for livestock. Post Mortems are important as sometimes they give the only opportunity to find out what was going on in that animal before it died. Often new or returning conditions are first noticed in the Post Mortem rooms of the Animal and Plant Health Agency. It is quite noticeable that the areas with the higher carcass submission rates are the ones that are close to a laboratory that is still open.

Unwelcome Guests

Your help is needed. Up to 2012 dogs that travelled abroad were required to have a supervised tick treatment as well as a tapeworm tablet before they were allowed to come back into this country. The dangers of pets travelling freely are not just from Rabies there are other diseases that we do not get here that cause chronic problems in Europe. Many of these such as Babesia, which is difficult to treat, are transmitted by ticks. At the end of last year a species of tick that was not thought to live here was discovered at a Park in Essex. Several dogs that had not travelled to Europe were found with Babesia, after a time it was realised that all of them had been walked in this particular park.

Sign the Petition

Our advice has always been if you must take your dog abroad is to make sure it is treated with a reliable spot on tick product before you go. This is easy to do. The better ones repel ticks before they have a chance to bite so you will never see them or the diseases they bring. Unfortunately not everybody does this and although there are extra pages in the pet passport for health checks before travel they are not usually used and dogs still come back with ticks and the problems they bring.

Because of this Natalie has started an online petition to try and get the compulsory tick treatment reinstated for dogs that have a pet passport. It’s easy to do just go to https//petition.parliament.uk/petitions/1316 and click the box.

New Movement Rules

From this month new rules have come in about animal movements. As I understand it with the new scheme livestock movements up to ten miles from your home holding to other ground that you own or rent will not require you to register them as a movement, the limit was five miles previously. Apparently the changes, originally recommended by the Task Force on Farming Regulation, form part of the government’s on-going programme to boost UK food and farming’s productivity by cutting unnecessary red tape and the time you spend on excessive form filling.

The new system for registering land on which livestock are kept will be run jointly by the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) and Rural Payments Agency (RPA) and will also improve information about animal movements and land being used for livestock production which is important for helping prevent and control diseases.

Under the existing animal movement regime, many farmers must report livestock movements to any other land they own or rent beyond a five-mile radius of their home farm. The reporting automatically triggers a six-day lockdown on the farm during which no animals can be moved. There is also a raft of different rules for sheep, cattle and pigs under a complicated web of schemes, including the Cattle Tracing System Links and Sole Occupancy Authorities.

 

Gradual Change

The new scheme, to be phased in over 12 months, will apparently replace this complicated bureaucracy and all farmers will be able to move their animals around any land they have registered and are using within a 10-mile radius without the need for reporting, or standstills. This doesn’t seem to be a big change as most farms move stock within the five mile limit anyway. Reporting and standstill requirements for livestock movements to other farms or businesses will continue to apply.

Contact Details

As we come towards the end of our refurbishment after the fire we will this month be upgrading our computer system. When we get it fully working it should be easier for us to send you information by text message and e mail. Please let us know your e mail address and any changes with your mobile number so we can keep your records up to date. All you need to do is just say hello to minsterleyvet@gmail.com.

Anthrax Investigations

I note that on the latest figures for notifiable disease investigations for England and Wales from January to April of this year there were no animals that were investigated for possible Anthrax. That is worrying because anthrax is the cause of sudden death in cattle and it is impossible to tell, by just looking at a dead cow that anthrax is not involved. Anthrax is investigated from a blood smear usually taken from the ear of the animal that has died. In the past we used to investigate three or four animals each week. Cases got less when Animal Health, I think it was then, started to ask twenty questions about the animal and where it was found before we went on the visit. Often they would decide a test was not necessary and nothing further would happen. The reason for testing cattle for anthrax is that if an infected cow was cut up spores of the disease would get in the air and affect the people who work on the carcass. There is still a risk from this disease and it is wrong that it mainly ignored now.            

 

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