Delay in sounding foot-and-mouth alarm criticised

A farmer and his vet took five days to sound the alarm about a possible foot-and-mouth infection.

The Waikato farmer first noticed lesions around Wednesday, November 23, but did not contact his vet until the Friday.

The vet did not go to the property until the following Monday, and when he did, alerted Biosecurity NZ.

Biosecurity NZ incursion and investigation manager Matthew Stone said farmers and vets must act quickly when they recognise symptoms which could be signs of foot-and-mouth disease.

A specialist vet then went to the farm once the alarm was finally raised. He decided to fly in an in an investigator from Upper Hutt, who arrived that night to send samples to Biosecurity NZ laboratories in Upper Hutt, which gave the "all clear" by midnight on the Tuesday.

The animals did not have high temperatures and their lesions were confined to the mouth -- rather than the blisters on lips, gums, teats and feet often seen with foot-and-mouth -- but the farmer voluntarily kept all stock on his property during the scare.

It was still not certain what caused the lesions but Mr Stone said he suspected the animals were affected by bovine papular stomatitis or pseudo cowpox, which causes harmless lesions.

Mr Stone said foot and mouth was such a rapid-spreading disease that he would have preferred the farmer and the vet to have got the cows' symptoms checked out sooner.

"That sort of delay does cause us concern...speed is of the essence."

Mr Stone said Biosecurity NZ had between five and 10 foot-and-mouth disease alerts annually and about half were pseudo cowpox.

A similar case had occurred on a neighbouring property two years ago, when the problem was blamed on a suspected toxin.

And concerns about foot and mouth were also raised several months ago in the Waikato during an outbreak of illness which turned out to be tetanus and bovine viral diarrhoea.

Mr Stone said Biosecurity NZ's practice was not to go public about suspected foot-and-mouth cases until the disease was confirmed and people needed to be informed. That policy helped avoid unnecessary damage to the economy and New Zealand's reputation.

- nzpa