Animal diseases 'may reappear'

Disinfecting trucks helps now: The inquiry will ask how to keep diseases out of the UK

By BBC News Online's environment correspondent Alex Kirby

The UK scientist heading an investigation into diseases like foot-and-mouth believes old threats could re-emerge.

Professor Sir Brian Follett chairs the Royal Society inquiry commissioned by the UK Government to examine the scientific aspects of infectious diseases in livestock.

He says the inquiry is an opportunity to look again at policies accepted for years. And vaccinating animals against foot-and-mouth will be a crucial point of the inquiry, he believes.

Sir Brian, a zoologist at the University of Oxford, was speaking in London as he invited submissions to the inquiry and announced details of its membership.

Seeking help

As well as virologists and epidemiologists, the inquiry panel includes a farmer, two practising veterinary surgeons, and consumer representatives.

Poultry diseases are one concern

Sir Brian said: "The other two inquiries commissioned by the government will be looking at administrative issues and the future of farming, and we will keep in touch to ensure that all relevant information is shared.

"The committee is keen to hear a full range of views on the scientific questions, and to hear from all those who have something to contribute.

"At this stage, we want to know in particular what people think the major scientific questions are that the inquiry should address, the main diseases that it should cover, and which people and organisations we should be contacting for evidence."

Sir Brian said the committee had identified the main issues it expected to tackle:

• surveillance for early warning and prediction of outbreaks
• control strategies once an outbreak has occurred
• preventive methods
• animal disease research in the UK and abroad.

He said: "This is a scientific inquiry, and it offers an opportunity for the first time for many years to assess how the nation tries to handle these outbreaks.

Changing society

"Where the evidence we take reveals a difference of opinion, we have to try to find a way forward and say what science can do now, and what it may be able to do in the future.

New and old threats will be weighed

"The policies haven't changed in decades, nor have the diseases. But many things in society have changed. These include travel, the globalisation of trade, and climate change, which will bring into southern Europe diseases that weren't there before.

"We'll focus on foot-and-mouth, but we will look at other diseases - probably swine fevers, poultry problems like Newcastle's disease and avian influenza, and blue tongue disease in cattle.

"It seems to me important that we look at long-term trends, and at how diseases which have disappeared might re-emerge."

Strong views

Sir Brian told BBC News Online: "Whatever we do will be shaped by the politicians. The art of a good report is to produce recommendations that will carry the day.

"There are clearly quite disparate opinions on whether to vaccinate against foot-and-mouth disease. I see it as an absolutely core issue.

"We've already found quite a lot of strong views on both sides about the efficacy of vaccination."

Sir Brian said his committee hoped to report by early next summer.