The Minister for Agriculture has expressed concern at the latest outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease in Britain, which he saw as evidence that the epidemic in Britain remains out of control.
"I'm extremely worried about the cases over the weekend, some of which were several kilometres from the main centres of the disease. The geographical spread is very worrying," Mr Walsh said in Ostersund, Sweden, where he is attending a meeting of EU agriculture ministers.
Commenting on the agreement with the British authorities on increased disinfection at ports servicing the Republic, Mr Walsh said the Government would provide disinfectant equipment but would not send personnel. He declined to comment on how confusion had arisen over the deal.
Germany's Agriculture Minister, Ms Renate Kunast, said she would call today for a review of the EU's vaccination policy once the foot-and-mouth crisis was over. Her Dutch counterpart, Mr Laurens-Jan Brink horst, backed the call for a new approach to vaccinating, a practice banned throughout the EU for 10 years.
Mr Walsh warned that vaccinating animals was no substitute for preventing the disease from entering the EU and would prevent producers from selling meat to countries outside the EU.
The EU Food Safety Commissioner, Mr David Byrne, said there was no question of vaccinating all animals in the EU against the disease, not least because no single vaccine was likely to be effective.
But Mr Byrne expressed some sympathy with Ms Kunast's proposal to limit the distances animals may travel. The enormous increase in animal movements is regarded by many as a factor in the spread of foot-and-mouth. Mr Walsh rejected the idea that animal movements were a serious factor in spreading disease and insisted that it was more important to be able to trace the movements and history of each animal.
The Commission has proposed new rules to improve the conditions for long-distance livestock transport. They lay down new minimum standards for ventilation, temperature and humidity control and demand that lorries be equipped with monitoring and warning systems.
Mr Byrne said long-distance transport for animals should be the exception rather than the rule, and it must not cause unnecessary suffering to animals. The new rules apply only to the transport of livestock within the borders of the EU.
