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20 March 2003Veterinary Emergency Diagnostic Blood TestsNew Facility in DumfriesDr James IrvineFRSE DSc FRCPath FRCPEd FInstBiol
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Front Line FMD Unit for RegionA £2 MILLION foot-and-mouth crisis centre is being built in DumfriesThe state-of-the-art facility, which will create around 30 new jobs, will be Scotland’s first emergency centre for the disease. And with the capability to process 40,000 animal blood tests a week the new site could prove essential in stopping future outbreaks. Confirmation that the facility will be created at the Scottish Agricultural Centre’s (SAC) existing Dumfries site in St Mary’s Industrial Estate has delighted local veterinary staff. Site manager Dr Richard Laven says the centre is the first of its kind. He said: 'This is fantastic news for our region. This centre will provide Dumfries and Galloway, as well as the rest of Scotland, with an essential blood testing service. 'The idea of creating the facility has been discussed for the past few months and it was great news when it was confirmed that the Dumfries site had been chosen. 'During the foot-and-mouth outbreak testing was carried out in Surrey which created a huge backlog that led to serious problems. 'When this facility is completed we will be able to test animals on a day-to-day basis and keep the Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Department (SEERAD) informed of potential dangers. 'This will definitely be the first of its kind in Britain, maybe even the world.' With money from SEERAD and the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) confirmed, building work is expected to be completed by January 2004. Dr Laven feels staff in the region will now have the ability to trace and deal with a range of dangerous infections as well as foot-and-mouth. He added: 'On a day-to-day basis we will be checking for diseases such as Newcastle disease, which effects chickens, blue tongue disease, which can be found in sheep and cattle and also keeping an eye on diseases in other countries such as the avian flu, which is causing problems in Holland. 'And in the event of an outbreak the centre can be transformed into a emergency facility within a week and we could be blood testing up to 40,000 animals a week. 'Around 30 new posts with be created although I would imagine many of them will be filled by staff from across the country.' A spokesman for SEERAD said: 'We can confirm that in response to the foot-and-mouth inquiry that we have found a national facility to carry out blood testing in the event of another animal disease outbreak. 'We are working with the SAC to provide a serology unit at the college site in Dumfries and work is at an advanced stage. 'The funding will be provided through the Scottish Executive and DEFRA.' The foot-and-mouth crisis had a catastrophic effect on the region’s farming industry with more than four million animals being culled. The outbreak began in England in February 2001 and spread to Scotland within two weeks. The first case north of the border was recorded at Netherplace Farm, Lockerbie on March 1 and spread rapidly through Annandale and Eskdale, Nithsdale and into the west of the region. There were 2000 confirmed cases in the UK including more than 170 in Dumfries and Galloway. In total more than 4.2 million animals were slaughtered during the outbreak including nearly 3.5 million sheep, 580,000 cattle and 146,000 pigs. |
To date as far as Land-Care is aware, there has been no information about this development on the websites of SAC, SEERAD or DEFRA.
Nevertheless the development is not unexpected as the first recommendation of the Royal Society of Edinburgh FMD Inquiry (2) under the heading ”Biology and Disease Control” is
SEERAD should identify a regional laboratory in Scotland to undertake diagnosis of FMD using tests where live virus is not required. The latter should remain the responsibility of Pirbright. (paragraph 61)
Paragraph 61 reads:
We recommend that SEERAD identify a regional laboratory in Scotland to undertake diagnosis of FMD using tests where live virus is not required. The latter should remain the responsibility of Pirbright.
Presumably this development in Dumfries is the regional laboratory referred to. All the same it is a bit strange that the public finds out because an enterprising journalist wonders what a new building in an Industrial Estate is for.
The creation of such a regional laboratory is good news. Yet there must be some worries about communication which is so important in the management of any emergency. One wonders why the authorities did not see the PR advantage of telling the populace of the good news that the creation of this facility had been approved, had been funded and was indeed now under construction.
When Land-Care contacted SAC the spokesperson said that:
“the SAC do not have anything to say about the facility at the moment as it is still in the early stages, and that they had not arranged any formal announcement as yet.”
When Land-Care contacted SEERAD, Clarke Pearson of SEERAD, Animal Health and Welfare said:
“It will not be a FMD centre only. The existing SAC testing facility in Dumfries & Galloway will be moving into a new building that is currently being constructed. When finished the building will be of such a standard that, in the event of an outbreak of FMD, it could be used as a testing centre.
The facility is being built as part of the contingency plans in response to the three FMD Inquiries (Royal Society London, Royal Society of Edinburgh and Anderson), which all stated that Scotland needed such a facility.
It is hoped that the building will be functional by the end of the year. The work is still in the early stages.”
No doubt nearer the time we will hear more about the nature of the diagnostic blood tests that the authorities intend to do there. Hopefully these will include the range of tests required to distinguish FMD vaccinated from FMD infected livestock and for which approval has already been given by the O.I.E. for use on a herd basis. Such tests are central to a vaccinate-to-live policy.
Hopefully also the new facility may operate as a base for a rapid task force that can go to the sites of suspected outbreaks of infection (such as FMD) using mobile RT-PCR technology to detect virus with the minimum of delay (3).
©Teviot Scientific Consultancy
References
1. McInally,
Gavin (2003). Front Line FMD Unit for Region. Dumfries and Galloway
Standard, 19 March 2003.
www.inside-scotland.co.uk/dumandgall/standard/index.html
2. The Royal Society of Edinburgh (2002). Inquiry into Foot and Mouth Disease in Scotland, July 2002. (Downoad PDF).
3. Callahan, J. D., Brown, F., Osorio, F. A., Sur, J. H., Kramer, E., Long, G. W., Lubroth, J., Ellis, S. J., Shoulars, K. S., Gaffney, K. L., Rock, D. L. and Nelson, W. M. (2002). Use of a portable real-time reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction assay for rapid detection of foot-and-mouth disease virus. J. Am. Vet. Med. Assoc., 220:1636–1642. (View Abstract).
Further Reading Recommended by Land-Care
FMD Forum (2003). Response to DEFRA FMD Contingency Plan.
(Filed 23 January 2003, www.land-care.org.uk,
click
here to view).
Marshall, Mary (2003). Comments on DEFRA’s FMD Contingency
Plan, Version 2.5
(Filed 12 March 2003, www.land-care.org.uk,
click
here to view).
Irvine, W. J. (2002). Comments on the Draft Report of the EU FMD
Inquiry. Land-Care.
(Filed 7 October 2003, www.land-care.org.uk,
click
here to view).
DEFRA Consultation on FMD Contingency Plan. Response by National
Foot and Mouth Group (NFMG).
(Filed 11 March 2003, www.land-care.org.uk,
click here
to view).
DEFRA’s proposals for management of future outbreaks of FMD.
(Filed 3 January 2003, www.land-care.org.uk,
click
here to view).
DEFRA's Foot and Mouth Disease Contingency Plan, Version 2.5. (Download
PDF).
Final Report of the European Parliament Temporary Committee on Foot
and Mouth Disease (Filed 18 December
2002, www.land-care.org.uk, click
here to view).
EU Temporary Committee on FMD: Compare Draft Report (20th Sept 2002)
with Final Report (20th Nov 2002).
(Filed 28 November 2002, www.land-care.org.uk,
click
here to view).
Foot and Mouth Disease Inquiry Reports. Land-Care. Click
here to view.
Contingency Planning Reports. Land-Care. Click
here to view.