FOOT-AND-MOUTH DISEASE.

Taranaki Daily News, 30 April 1931, Page 10

FOOT-AND-MOUTH DISEASE.

(To the Editor,)

Sir, —Your issue of April 27 reports Mr. R. W. D. Robertson as stating, “We have been a little too scared about foot, and mouth disease in New Zealand,” and, further, that “we are looked upon just a little as a laughing stock because we are too cautious.” The idea of good

Scotsmen laughing at us for being cautious will tickle many of your readers, some of whom no doubt will ascribe the hilarity less to deliberate reason than to the effect of one or more brands of bottled spirit for which Mr. .Robertson’s country is famous. In my opinion, the action of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union in this matter should be supported by every farmer in the Dominion. No one who remembers anything of the disastrous visitations of this disease in the ’seventies of last century and earlier would dream of relaxing the embargo upon importation until Great Britain has been clear of the trouble for a considerable time. We all know and recognise the debt we owe to scientists and veterinarians, and quite realise the new light their research, has shed on many problems, but, alas, we alsovknow that every now and again human diseases which are supposed to have been eliminated, or, at least, effectively guarded against, do break out in various places. These happenings are learnedly called sporadic outbreaks and are, generally speaking, isolated and stamped out with comparatively little damage. Nevertheless they have occurred, and do occur, where and when it was supposed there was not the remotest chance of their appearing on the scene. Are outbreaks of disease any less likely to occur amongst animals which are more numerous, and less capable of effective control, than human beings? Surely not.

Foot-and-mouth disease can be contracted by sheep, pigs and goats, as well as cattle, and human beings are known to have been afflicted by it. Hares are also believed to have carried the disease from place to place, and deer are also suspect. The disease is both difficult and expensive to contend wiiih in fully occupied and cleared countries like England. and Scotland; how, then, could it be dealt with in New Zealand? Take Taranaki, one of the closest settled districts in New Zealand, and assume an outbreak which spread to the goats. Imagination can fill in details. But Mr. Robertson says the vets., etc., say the chances of importing the disease are nil. Theoretically this may be correct, yet what happened in the United States of America? The disease was unknown there until 1902, when an outbreak took place in one of the Eastern States. Drastic steps were at once taken, and the disease was “stamped out,” and authorities, including vets., etc., were of the opinion that i,t would never obtain a footing in the country. The unruly complaint has since then set its foot down in various places, and each footprint has cost Uncle Sam piles of his cherished dollars, and caused the destruction of at least one of the world’s finest herds of dairy cattle.' United States scientists, who are fairly thorough, considered all and every germ had been killed or sterilised, and the danger of any more trouble was “nil”; yet some old-man germ—perhaps a presumed mummylived on beyond the time when he mathematically apd scientifically should have been dead and defunqt, and. suddenly and awkwardly came to new life and vigour, with disastrous results. The inference is obvious.

The herds and flocks of New Zealand constitute its chief source of wealth and well-being. Let us see that we leave no door open for this dread disease to secure a foothold, or we shall only repent once, viz., ever after. In the meantime, we can afford to be laughed at, no,t once, but many times. —I am, etc., GEORGE GIBSON. Rahotu, April 28, 1931. P.S.—-Incidentally, the milk of affected animals is highly contagious. I have not time to deal with Jersey . Island, which, correctly understood, has not much weight.—-G.G.