How do you go to the European Union fight against the latest foot and mouth images?
Fifth fever is a viral disease that mainly affects cattle, sheep, goats and pigs. The disease is not a threat to human health, but infected animals suffer a lot and their production of milk or meat is reduced. Most animals survive infection, but the highly contagious virus can be transported for a long time, hence the need to quickly contain any outbreak through quarantine and the slaughter of infected and healthy animals.
The EU has an extended legal framework to control the outbreaks, including restrictions on the trade of susceptible animals and their products. All member states are required to have contingency plans. State laboratories backed by the State must collaborate with the EU reference laboratory so that experts can help define the best emergency measures for each outbreak. The killing and commercial restrictions resulting from this often cause great economic losses throughout the agricultural sector. The affected Member States can request the allocation of EU compensation funds after calculating the total costs suffered by farmers and the sector supply chain.
In Slovakia, the virus of the disease of the foot and mouth so far has been detected in at least six agricultural explorations and has been sacrificed between 6000 and 7000 animals. Hundreds of agricultural explorations are under strict surveillance and disinfected.
Outside the perimeter of the affected area, the exploration of Mikulas agricontrate dairy has so far saved the disease. But the eventual detection of a single virus inside would imply the sacrifice of its 6000 animals, including 3000 dairy cows. Every year, the exploration produces around 35 million liters of milk. He uses 200 people and is one of the main employers in this mainly rural area of Slovakia.
Access is restricted. Workers and incoming machines are subject to strict disinfection procedures.
“We are spraying the wheels of all trucks. The employees that enter have to go through a clean and dirty zone and shower twice a day,” explains the farmer and owner of the company, Martin Zahumenský. “It is very stressful. Every time I receive one (another) called agricultural, we expect bad news and, to be honest, I cannot sleep very well. We are very worried about the business.”
Its agricultural activity includes 5500 hectares of fields where corn, soy and wheat are grown, especially to feed dairy cows, the cornerstone of all its agribusiness.
The fifth is a family business founded 30 years ago by Martin’s father. They have observed with increasing anxiety towards the way in which the virus has destroyed other agricultural explorations in the region.
“I’m sorry for those affected,” says Marian Zahumenský, farmer and CEO of the farm. “One of the affected explorations is a member of the same association of creators that we work in a close collaboration. I imagine the tragedy that has killed them; I identify deeply with the people who built and care for all their flock. It was a great effort and years of work.”
“All farmers are affected economically by the current situation, because they have to spend a lot of money in disinfection and all kinds of biosecurity measures,” Martin explains. “Then, first of all, the government should reimburse them and help them cover these costs. And in cases of explorations they have had to kill all their animals, they have to reimburse these losses very quickly, because without … Government’s help, without the help of the European Union, these explorations will not be able to work again.”
To contain the propagation of the foot and mouth disease virus, some border stations between Austria and Hungary were closed. Others, between Slovakia and neighbors Hungary and the Czech Republic, are being carefully controlled.
Since the beginning of the crisis, the State Institute of Veterinarians of Olomouc, in the Czech Republic, has received, twice a week, milk samples of 57 explorations of the area affected in Slovakia.
These analyzes are crucial to control the potential propagation of the disease in the EU.
The virus is the calamite of animals and agricultural production, but generally does not affect people, insists the director of the laboratory: “The milk that was pasteurized and the flesh that was subjected to the maturation process, especially if it is still late by heat, it is safe and does not endanger the health of consumers,” explains Jan Bardoň.
Will you be prepared for Europe properly to avoid the spread of the virus through its open borders and its common market?
ADVERTISING“European cooperation is at a very good level,” says Bardoň. “There is a rapid alert system through which the veterinary authorities of each Member State are immediately reported. There is a unique EU prevention strategy, but each country has to adapt to its specific geographical or climatic conditions, local resources or the characteristics of agricultural explorations. There is, for example, a difference between an exploration with 10,000 head of cattle and an exploration of five chow.”
The European Commission has just remembered the affected member states that emergency measures must continually adapt to the evolution of the epidemiological situation.
