FOOT AND MOUTH - CRY OF DESPAIR FROM A FARMER WHO ASKED FOR HIS ANIMALS TO BE KILLED SO THAT HE WOULD NOT SEE THEM SUFFER - Filenews 9/3 by Angelos Nikolaou
In a move that causes emotion and concern about the appearance of cases of foot-and-mouth disease, the owner of a large livestock unit with about 480 cows himself asked the Veterinary Services for the immediate euthanasia of his herd. The reason? His inability to see his animals suffering helplessly from pain.
Cows show the harshest symptoms of the disease: open, bleeding sores in the mouth that prevent them from eating even the softest grass, and deep ulcers on the legs that make any attempt to stand up a painful experience.
The element that causes great concern to the authorities is that this unit was fully vaccinated. Despite prevention, the virus managed to infect the population in an extremely aggressive way, since the body had not begun to produce sufficient antibodies.
The image of animals crawling on the ground with intense salivation and high fever, prompted the owner to a decision that is in stark contrast to the incidents we have seen in other areas, where breeders, clouded by despair, harass state officials.
Just last Saturday we have witnessed scenes of tension, with livestock farmers obstructing the work of killing in an attempt to save their livelihood.
"This is the first time we see a producer pressuring us to speed up the killing process, not to get compensation, but to stop the torture of his animals," says a source in the Veterinary Services.
The killing and landfilling process is expected to be completed within the next 24 hours to prevent further spread.
The killing of the animals in the foot-and-mouth disease unit comes just one day after the initiative taken by the President of the Republic to contact the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, to find a solution to save livestock farming.
