Back to HOMEPAGE Do Scottish livestock farmers realise that
the Scottish Government is not scheduled
to place an order for Bluetongue
vaccine until the end of June?
James Irvine
Teviot Scientific, Cultybraggan Farm, Comrie, Perthshire
Filed 10 May 08
©www.land-care.org.uk
On 20th December 2007 Defra announced it had ordered 20 million doses of bluetongue serotype 8 vaccine from Intervet for England and a further 2.5 million doses for Wales (1). The first three million doses of that order have now been delivered for use in England within the Protection Zone. Many other EU Member States have also placed firm orders for vaccine against this bluetongue serotype. But so far the Scottish Government has not.
At the meeting on 7th March 2008 between the Scottish Chief Veterinary Officer, Charles Milne, and Scottish stakeholders it was agreed that the ordering of sufficient bluetongue vaccine serotype 8 to cover all the cattle and sheep in Scotland should be put in motion.
Great relief was felt that there would be no further delays in reaching this important, but somewhat belated, decision. It was also hoped that the practicalities of placing the order, and expediting its delivery, would be handled with all possible speed (2). Indeed, in the same article the following optimistic comment was made
"What is needed is to have the vaccine available for immediate use as soon as the unreasonable constraints imposed by the EC can be lifted, or as soon as possible under the existing bizarre EC rules. Allegedly the order books of Intervet and of Merial are full, making their delivery dates unacceptable. There is thought that there is a possibility that Fort Dodge may be able to supply Scotland with an efficient, safe vaccine by June 2008. Let us hope so."
But the reality has turned out to be somewhat different. A firm order for Scotland's 12 million doses of bluetongue vaccine is allegedly not scheduled to be placed until the end of June. Apparently this is due to the bureaucracy of the tendering process when public funds are involved. Apparently no prior tendering for such a potential order from Scotland had taken place. While assurances have been given that there should be no problems with the delivery of such an order, this is perhaps hard to credit in view of the now massive demands from many countries for the vaccine
But Scotland's Chief Veterinary Officer does not appear to be unduly bothered. According to him earlier predictions that bluetongue disease might reach into north Perthshire, and possibly beyond, by October 2008 have been revised to indicate that the risk of bluetongue reaching Scotland at all in 2008 is low. He takes the view that, even although bluetongue may reach Scotland in 2008, it will probably only manifest itself in the form of a few mild cases that his Department can deal with using "standard methods".
But this confidence on the part of Scotland's CVO was apparently based on research by epidemiological modellers that was not available to the public. Now that research, such as it is, has been published in an article entitled "Report on the distribution of bluetongue infection in Great Britain on 15 March 2008" (3). It was prepared by the National Emergency Epidemiology Group, the constituent members of which are not divulged.
For all the reassurances in the text of this lengthy report, what is important is the following statement in its conclusions
"The evidence also indicates uncertainty around the precise extent of herd level infection (here defined as more than 1 animal on a holding affected) beyond the current western and northern boundaries of PZ1. If such infection exists it could provide a focus for recrudescence of BTV in 2008.
"Note that the evidence available was not collected for the purposes of this analysis and in consequence a number of important assumptions, and estimates to replace missing data have been made. These add to the uncertainty over the extent of BTV in GB".
National Emergency Epidemiology Group
18 April 2008 [Revised 30 April]
There would appear to be little basis for Scotland's CVO to be so confident that bluetongue will not trouble Scotland significantly this summer or autumn.
Presumably, the National Emergency Epidemiology Group is a different group from that set up in Scotland to look at the risk of bluetongue reaching Scotland in 2008 and beyond. It is known as the EPIC group.
The EPIC Group is a consortium of six scientific establishments in Scotland under the umbrella of an organisation called Epidemiological and Population Health and Infectious Diseases Control Centre. It consists of the Glasgow Veterinary School, Edinburgh University's Centre of Infectious Diseases, the Moredun Institute, Scottish Agricultural College, Aberdeen's Macauley Land Use Research Institute and the Biomathematics and Statistics Scotland Research Institute.
To my knowledge this group has not yet reported. It was asked by the Scottish Government to undertake the work as late as December 2007, but on account of contractual problems was not given the go ahead until a month later (4).
The reality must surely be that Scotland is vulnerable to bluetongue disease reaching it before the next Vector Free Period (probably starting late December 2008) and before bluetongue vaccination can be effective. It is for this reason that the Scottish Council of the National Beef Association is mounting a petition to the EU to grant Scotland a derogation whereby a window of opportunity is given to achieve effective vaccination without in the meantime permitting the influx of livestock from EU Member States where bluetongue disease is rife (5).
Sadly this highly reasonable petition, which also has the support of the European Livestock Association (6) does not appear to have the support of the Scottish Government, nor of the NFU Scotland, nor of the breakaway group called Scottish Beef Cattle Association. They all seem happy to suffer "a little bit of bluetongue disease" in Scotland this year in order to preserve short term trade. But keeping fingers crossed and hoping for just a little amount of disease is not a logical way of controlling the spread of this extremely damaging virus. The havoc that bluetongue has caused in northern Continental Europe in 2006 and 2007 should be warning enough.
To support the National Beef Association Scotland's Petition to get the EC to change its rules over bluetongue vaccination in bluetongue-free countries Click Here
©www.land-care.org.uk
References
1. Irvine, James (2007). Defra orders 22.2million doses of Bluetongue serotype
8 vaccine for England & Wales: for farmers to buy if they want to. What kind of health policy is that?
See ANIMAL HEALTH-GENERAL homepage, filed 20 Dec 07, www.land-care.org.uk Click Here to View
2. Irvine, James (2008). Scotland agrees at stakeholders meeting to order Bluetongue vaccine without further delay for all its cattle and sheep.
See HOMEPAGE, filed 07 Mar 08, www.land-care.org.uk Click Here to View
3. Defra (2008). Report on the distribution of bluetongue infection in Great Britain on 15 March 2008. Click Here to View pdf
4. Irvine, James (2008). EPIC Report on the risk assessment of Bluetongue reaching Scotland is
not due until end of April
See HOMEPAGE, filed 04 Apr 08, www.land-care.org.uk Click Here to View
5. Irvine J., McBean, H., Mathers, I. & Haywood, K. (2008). Letter to Scottish Farmer Click Here to View pdf
6. Article (2008). The European Livestock Association's letter to the European Commission concerning Bluetongue vaccination in Bluetongue-free countries or zones
See HOMEPAGE, filed 09 Apr 08, www.land-care.org.uk Click Here to View
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