British authorities are doing everything they can to eradicate
foot-and-mouth disease, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on
Saturday.
Speaking after a meeting of the government's emergency
contingencies committee COBRA, Brown said, "I want to do everything
in our power immediately to get to the scientific evident, to look
at the source of what has happened, to set up a number of inquiries
so that we can actually move very quickly to eradicate this disease
in Britain."
"We will be doing, night and day, everything in our power to
make sure that what happens quickly and decisively in way that can
reassure people that everything is being done," he added.
British government has already announced a nationwide ban on the
movement of all cattle, pigs and sheep to stop the new epidemic
after some 60 animals at a farm near Guildford, Surrey, in southern
England were tested positive for the foot-and-mouth disease on
Thursday.
The European Union is to ban British livestock exports as a
result of the disease, and Japanese government also decided to ban
British pork imports.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said that
a 3-km "protection zone" and a 10-km "surveillance zone" had been
established around the farm.
The latest outbreak of this disease raised fears of another
catastrophe like the one in 2001, which brought chaos to Britain
and left farming and tourist industries devastated.
(Xinhua News Agency August 5, 2007)
