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England’s foot-and-mouth disease outbreak signals need for animal I.D. system in U.S.
8/14/2007
Catherine Merlo
The recent reappearance of foot-and-mouth disease in Great Britain is a
reminder that the U.S. needs a national animal identification system to
be better prepared in case a similar outbreak ever occurred here, the
National Milk Producers Federation said today.
Although it now appears that the outbreak of FMD in Great Britain has
been confined to two farms near London, “the fact that
history has repeated itself just six years after a devastating FMD
epidemic in England and other European nations should give U.S.
livestock producers pause for thought,” said Jerry Kozak,
NMPF’s president and CEO.
“We need to learn from history that having the ability to
identify farms, and animals, is a key bulwark of our biosecurity
system,” Kozak said. “And right now, we have more
work to do to improve that system.”
NMPF and other dairy organizations involved in the IDairy coalition
will be working in the next year to spur the voluntary registration of
dairy farms as part of a national system identifying where livestock
are located.
“Part of the reason the British government was able to
contain this latest outbreak is because they established quarantines
and surveillance zones around the initial site of the
outbreak,” he added.“That only works if you know
which farms to quarantine – and that is information our
government is lacking.”
NMPF is working with five other organizations: the American Jersey
Cattle Association, the Dairy Calf & Heifer Association, the
Holstein Association USA, the National Association of Animal Breeders,
and the National Dairy Herd Information Association, in the IDairy
coalition to promote the need for dairy farmers to register their
premises with state agencies. Learn more at IDairy’s website:
http://www.idairy.org/where.html.
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2010
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