We need a plan to vaccinate not cull animals in order to deal with foot and mouth disease - Paul Andrews

The virus, which mutates, is transmitted through the air like flu or the common cold, and most animals start recovering after about six weeks.

However, the animal's temporary loss of weight or milking potential can set farm incomes back for several months, and it is for this reason that few countries which are free of the disease want to trade live or dead animals with countries where the disease is endemic.

It is a commercial issue, which has nothing to do with animal welfare or food hygiene.

There are two ways of dealing with the disease: killing the animals or vaccinating them.

The cull depends on the animals that are in the infected herd being kept totally isolated from other animals before slaughter.

It also depends on the use of disinfectant, because the virus, as well as being transmitted through the air, can also be picked up on the feet of people or other living creatures and carried to other places.

Unfortunately, a farm is not just the home of the farmer and farm animals. Wild deer cross the land unseen. So do other creatures.

It may be possible to cull all the deer and dartmoor ponies, to gas all the badgers, and snare, shoot or poison the more visible and ‘protected’ wildlife in the countryside, but there's no way you can hope to eliminate all the otters, voles, moles, stoats, weasels, squirrels, mice, rats and rabbits who might unwittingly carry the disease.

Crows are known to perch on the backs of sheep. So, are we going to try and kill all the crows?

Honeybees have a range of six miles from the hive. So, should we put all the beekeepers out of business?

Foxhunting has been abolished, but will this mean fewer foxes or make the fox behave like a gentleman, and wash his feet in disinfectant, as he goes from one farm to another?

The householder can keep his dog on her lead and walk her on the road, but how many people are going to keep their cats at home and stop them roaming the fields at night?

The culling policy worked in 1967, but when it broke out again in 2001 and later in 2007, it devastated the farming industry and set rural tourism back light years.

The world has moved on since 1967. At that time animals were killed locally: now superstores insist that they be taken long distances for slaughter.

In 1967, most people still lived close to their place of work. There were only two motorways. People travelled less and so it was much easier to contain the disease. This is no longer true.

There were 14,096,000 licensed vehicles in 1967: in 1999, there were 23,975,000. In 1979, all motor vehicles travelled 256 billion vehicle kilometers:

The figures for 2024 are 41.7 million licensed vehicles which travelled 532.4 billion kilometers

Now, there are almost twice as many cars travelling almost twice as far. So, would it be surprising if animals were to pick up the infection from cars coming from infected areas?

So, if Foot and Mouth strikes again, are we planning to do another cull and ruin our farming and tourist industries yet again, or could we try planning something different?

We were told before that a policy of vaccination would be a confession to other countries that the disease is endemic within the UK.

So, does the fact that most UK citizens have been vaccinated against smallpox, TB or polio mean that smallpox, TB and polio are endemic within the UK?

We were told before that it would be difficult to identify vaccinated animals, because their blood samples would be similar to those of diseased animals. So, why can't the vaccinated animals have their ears tagged to distinguish them from the rest?

We were told before that animals would lose weight and milk-producing capacity if they are vaccinated - but wouldn't a vaccinated herd be better than no herd at all?

And why would all animals have to be vaccinated anyway?

Why couldn't there be a cordon sanitaire of vaccinated animals rather than a cordon sanitaire of dead animals?

And finally, if a policy of vaccination is so detrimental, why is it that there are other countries in the developed world which have it, and seem to be able to manage without a cull?

Paul Andrews is a freelance writer and author. He is an honorary alderman of North Yorkshire council and a former mayor of Malton. www.paul-andrews.net