Mass disease screening under way

Vets began herding most of the area's 13,000 sheep

Vets have begun a massive foot-and-mouth screening programme on the mid Wales hills amid fears the disease could be biting back.

Up to 13,000 sheep are being herded in from the Brecon Beacons, Powys, for blood tests after a recent cluster of outbreaks around the villages of Libanus and Crickhowell.

Crisis in Wales

Total confirmed cases in Wales - 106

Powys - 69 cases

Anglesey - 13 cases

Monmouthshire - 19 cases

Caerphilly 2

Rhondda Cynon Taff - 1

Neath Port Talbot -1

Newport - 3

It is the biggest operation of its kind in Wales since the epidemic began in February, involving an area of 10 square kilometres.

Farmers and DEFRA officials have built four special holding pens to keep the sheep until test results are returned in around a week.

On Saturday, workers built a makeshift shelter where blood samples from every animal are being tested.

Sample testing has already been done and, whilst tests have proved negative, government officials decided to widen the net.

The screening involves the majority of the 13,000 thousand sheep roaming hundreds of acres high on the slopes of the Beacons.

Slight relief

The outcome of those initial tests came as a relief to many farmers who feared that the tens of thousands of sheep which are kept on the hillsides near Brecon might have faced slaughter

As a precaution, a ban on the movement of all animals has been extended as far as the Heads of the Valleys and into the Upper Swansea Valley.

More than 13,000 sheep graze on the Brecon Beacons

The only livestock allowed to move are now those bound for slaughter.

But farmers remain nervous - any spread of the disease would be a disastrous blow.

Wales had gone a whole month without a confirmed case of foot-and-mouth when an outbreak on a farm in Libanus surprised and devastated Brecon locals.

Fast results

Troubled Powys business owners are hoping for encouraging results from the latest round of tests.

The blood tests on the animals will be fast tracked the first results will be back in about a week.

In the nearby area of Crickhowell, a fresh cluster of the disease began to emerge last weekend.

Thousands of animal have been slaughtered as a result - including 3,000 sheep from the nearby Sugar Loaf mountain.