The fight against foot-and-mouth disease

There are still good reasons why the European Union is refusing to vaccinate against foot-and-mouth as a matter of (purely preventive) course. Any system which undertakes years of extensive vaccinating, even when the virus is nowhere to be found, pays immensely for both the serum and blocked exports.

The cost-benefit analysis looks entirely different when the epidemic has already gained a toehold. Then a phobia against inoculation can have serious consequences. Has this second phase already been attained in the EU? Emergency vaccination, as just ordered by the British government at long last, is also possible under existing European laws.

In Britain, vaccinations ought to have begun much earlier. In fact a recommendation suggesting that can be found in a scientific report already ordered in 1999 by the EU Commission. In this prophetic paper, the scientists precisely outline the criteria for emergency vaccinations, writing that it should be undertaken whenever the epidemic gets out of control, when dense cattle populations are threatened and when there is a danger that aerial infection may follow.

All of this applies to Britain as well as the sensitive border region separating Germany and the Netherlands. To make it plain: this scenario involves regionally-restricted vaccinations which ought not to be met with international trade bans on all meat exports from the EU. The fact that many states do not hold to this rule should not prevent the EU's veterinary committee from doing the right thing within its own sphere of responsibility.

-- Sueddeutsche Zeitung, Germany