Foot-and-mouth illness outbreak results in border closures in Europe | EUROtoday

Central Europe is grappling with an outbreak of foot-and-mouth illness amongst cattle, prompting border closures and the culling of 1000’s of animals.

The extremely contagious virus was first detected in early March on a Hungarian cattle farm.

Within two weeks, it unfold to a few farms in neighbouring Slovakia.

Since the preliminary discovery, three extra Hungarian farms and an extra three Slovakian farms have reported circumstances, marking the primary outbreak in each nations in over 50 years. Authorities are working to comprise the unfold of the illness.

“Everything is completely upside down” in the area as farmers fear for their own herds and transportation is disrupted by border closures, said Sándor Szoboszlai, a local entrepreneur and hunter in the Hungarian town of Levél where nearly 3,000 cattle had to be culled after the disease was discovered on a farm.

“We didn’t even think such a thing could happen. Who could count on that? Nobody,” he said. “There are big farms in the area, but I don’t think it was the fault of the animal owners, that’s for sure. The wind blew it here.”

Foot-and-mouth disease primarily affects cloven-hooved animals like cattle, sheep, goats, pigs and deer, and results in fevers and blisters in the mouth and hooves. The virus spreads through contact between animals, or on surfaces like clothing, skin and vehicles, or on the wind. It poses little danger to humans.

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On Friday, authorities in Hungary continued to conduct operations aimed at stopping the spread of the disease and disinfecting affected farms and vehicles in the area. Mats doused in a powerful disinfectant were placed at the entrances and exits of towns and villages across the region to eliminate virus molecules that may cling to tires — though many of those mats quickly went dry and were swept partially off the road by passing vehicles.

This week, the Slovakian government, citing insufficient containment measures by Hungary, closed 16 of their common borders and one with Austria, all of them lesser-trafficked crossings so authorities can focus on conducting border checks at the major ones. Last week, Austria — where there have been no reported cases — closed 23 of its border crossings with Hungary and Slovakia.

Authorities in the Czech Republic, relatively distant from the Hungarian and Slovakian farms where the disease has been detected, have introduced disinfection measures at all the five border crossings used by freight trucks entering the country.

Jiri Cerny, associate professor at the Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, said the most significant risk of transmission is “through contaminated human objects” such as ”tires and cars, on the soles of shoes, and through contaminated food.” The Czech Agriculture Minister, Marek Výborný, has said the restrictions could be lifted 30 days after the last farm animal infected with foot-and-mouth disease has been culled in Slovakia.

No new infections have been discovered in Hungary this week, and the cleanup of the last infected farms will likely be completed on Saturday, István Nagy, Hungary’s agricultural minister said on Friday.

Earlier this week, a Hungarian official said in a news conference that the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak may have been caused by “an artificially produced virus.”

Without citing particular proof to again his claims, Gergely Gulyás, chief of workers to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, stated it could not be dominated out that the illness had been launched in Hungary as a “organic assault,” including that the suspicion was based mostly on verbal statements from a laboratory abroad that had begun preliminary evaluation of viral samples.

Hungary’s authorities has promised to institute a mortgage cost moratorium for affected farmers, and to assist compensate them for the lack of their animals and help in growing measures on farms to stop future outbreaks.

Szoboszlai, the hunter in Levél, choked up when talking concerning the native farmer who needed to cull his whole herd when the virus appeared, saying the scenario was “terrible.”

“I feel so sorry for him, because this is his life’s work,” he stated. “It will likely be very tough to start out over.”