Brazil campaign against foot-and-mouth

Argentina and Uruguay have been hard hit by the disease

By Tom Gibb in Sao Paulo

The Brazilian government has begun vaccinating cattle on its southern border with Uruguay after 11 cases of foot-and-mouth disease were confirmed.

There have been more than 2,000 cases of the disease in Uruguay, and Argentina is also badly affected.

The threat comes as Brazil was starting to boost its beef exports

The South American countries where foot-and-mouth has been endemic were working on a programme towards eradicating the disease, but the growing epidemic makes that increasingly difficult.

The Brazilian army has been deployed along the border for weeks, trying to prevent the epidemic in Uruguay from spreading into Brazil.

Now, the government is starting a programme involving more than 1,000 vets and agricultural technicians to vaccinate cattle in 25 municipalities along the border.

Isolated herds

The idea is to create a buffer-zone with neighbouring Uruguay and Argentina.

It will now also be illegal to move live animals from the southern area into the rest of the country.

With more than 150 million head of cattle, a major outbreak of the disease in Brazil would be disastrous.

The threat comes as Brazil is beginning to boost its beef exports, particularly to Europe, because it has been declared risk-free of mad cow disease.

European countries want to buy beef from countries that are free of foot-and-mouth, without having to use vaccination as a control method.

The Brazilian authorities say that the isolated outbreak and vaccination programme in the south should not hit exports immediately, as the bulk of the herd is well away from the affected border area.