Foot-and-mouth may have spread across English channel

12:00 pm - By John Lichfield

PARIS - The foot and mouth epidemic appeared to have reached the continent yesterday with a suspected, but unconfirmed, outbreak on a pig farm at Diksmuide, near Ostend, Belgium.

There were also reports of a suspected outbreak among British-born sheep on a farm near Saint Etienne in central France, but this was denied by the French agriculture ministry.

Officials said the French farm had been placed under quarantine because of the origin of the sheep. Reuters news agency quoted a local veterinary officer as saying that symptoms of foot and mouth disease had been found among the sheep, but that first tests had proved negative.

Agriculture ministry officials in Paris said that there was no suspicion of foot and mouth on the farm, at Roche-la-Molière in the Loire, and "no suspected or confirmed case anywhere in France".

More than 300 pigs at the Belgian farm were slaughtered yesterday and all movements off livestock in the country were banned. The French government also closed its northern border to Belgian livestock.

Continental farmers, already devastated by the BSE crisis, have been waiting for days to see if the British foot and mouth epidemic would cross the Channel. Even one or two cases – which would trigger food import bans from other countries in Europe and the world – could be disastrous for a country such as France, which depends heavily on agricultural exports.

Belgian officials said the first tests on animals at the Diksmuide farm had proved negative, despite the discovery of sores around the mouths of the pigs, a frequent first symptom of foot and mouth disease. Further tests had been carried out and the animals slaughtered as a matter of precaution.