Virus spreads in Netherlands

LONDON, England -- Two new cases of foot-and-mouth disease have been confirmed in the Netherlands, raising the number to 22.

The Dutch Agriculture Ministry said one of the latest cases was about 150 kilometres from the region where the existing 20 cases were clustered.

The other case was near the cluster in the centre of the country.

About 3,000 cattle and several thousand sheep from 37 farms surrounding the farm on the northern coast in Friesland would be slaughtered, ministry spokesman Gerard Westerhof told CNN.

"It is not likely that there has been contact between animals from this farm and farms (where the disease has been confirmed earlier). We are investigating if it has been transferred by humans," Westerhof said.

The spread in the Netherlands came as farmers in the UK rejected allegations that they are deliberately spreading foot-and-mouth disease.

UK media reports said a leaked report, drafted for Prime Minister Tony Blair, showed farmers had taken part in hundreds of unlicensed livestock movements since the start of the outbreak.

One farmer accused of moving animals without a licence in breach of foot-and-mouth regulations had been warned by police to leave the area for his own safety, the reports said.

The Ministry of Defence, which is helping control the highly infectious virus, was reported as saying it had heard of at least one farmer in Cumbria intentionally infecting his herd.

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But Cumbria police told CNN they had not had any cases referred to them for investigation.

"We had heard rumours, but we heard them five weeks ago. We have had no specific cases referred to us, but if we did we would investigate them with the Ministry of Agriculture (MAFF)," a police spokesman said.

The defence ministry also denied it knew of specific cases, saying it too had heard only rumours.

It said it was working "extremely well" in trying to help farmers and MAFF control the outbreak.

But the chairman of the National Farmers' Union (NFU) in Devon, David Hill, said he would rather people broke the law by moving animals than let them suffer and die in confinement.

Hill told the British Broadcasting Corporation he "could not condemn" farmers who moved animals illegally rather than see them dying in appalling conditions.

"I would rather they did that than let animals suffer," he said.

NFU Cumbria spokeswoman Gill Shearer told CNN she was surprised by the allegations of deliberately infecting animals and had not heard of any cases in Cumbria.

She said: "Any farmer who has had the disease say they would not want to put anyone else through it. Farmers in Cumbria are very fearful of getting it."

MAFF warned farmers to observe the "tightest possible precautions" as the number of foot-and-mouth cases passed 1,200 since the outbreak seven weeks ago.

About 890,000 infected or suspect animals have been slaughtered and nearly 480,000 are still waiting to be killed.

The prehistoric Stonehenge landmark in southern England was reopened to tourists on Tuesday, with visitors having to walk across beds of straw soaked with disinfectant to get to the site.

The tourism industry fears losing up to £250 million ($360 million) a week in the usually lucrative summer months if the epidemic keeps scaring people away.

Northern Ireland authorities said on Wedesday they had found a suspected case of foot-and-mouth disease 80 kilometres (50 miles) from its one confirmed case.

France has two cases of the disease.

The European Union's food safety commissioner David Byrne has said foot-and-mouth could cost the EU budget up to a quarter of a billion euros ($225 million).

Reuters contributed to this report.

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April 3, 2001

Dutch Agriculture Ministry
European Union
England Tourist Board
Foot-and-mouth disease
UK Ministry of Defence
National Farmers' Union

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