BVA Scottish Dinner - Presidential Speech
15 October 2001
DAVID TYSON'S SPEECH GIVEN AT THE BVA'S ANNUAL SCOTTISH DINNER HELD IN EDINBURGH ON MONDAY 15 OCTOBER 2001
Ladies and gentlemen, a formal good evening and welcome to the BVA's Scottish dinner. My thanks to you all for joining us. The officers are very grateful for the interest you have shown in the profession and we are delighted to have representatives here from the Scottish Parliament, agriculture, environmental health, the FSA, research institutions, the National Trust, Royal Society, the media, animal welfare interests and the veterinary profession.
Like the last home internationals I am performing out of season. I am no longer President but this event planned much earlier in the summer was postponed because of foot and mouth. Unlike most of our guests here I am an Englishman. Nevertheless thank you Scotland for bringing the Irish down to earth. The Welsh are so unreliable.
It is only twelve days ago since I gave a speech at the BVA Congress the subject was foot and mouth disease. Tonight it will be the same. But in this short space of time we are now faced with more major policy issues to grapple with. I briefly want to refer to these first.
The NFU Scotland's interest in the price of prescription-only medicines to the farmer resulting in Sir John Marsh's investigation has now been replaced by a "back to square one" exercise to be conducted by the OFT. Of course we will have to take this study seriously, but here we go again.
The last few weeks have also seen talk of the government's contingency plan to cull all sheep if BSE is found to have moved from cattle to sheep. We are all puzzled and more than a little concerned about might happen next.
At Congress I commented on our concerns about biological terrorism and within two days the President of the American Veterinary Medical Association was saying the same thing. We now have had the frightening experience of anthrax in Florida and New York, whatever the source. Today The Times ran a sizeable piece on the need for practitioners to be alert for signs of anthrax in animals.
We have recently been approached by the MHS who now wish to review the whole process of meat inspection. No doubt it is good to have comprehensive reviews and it is a major subject but it is another addition of desk top exercises that deflect us from real work.
At Winchester we devoted a whole day to discussing "From feed for animals to food for people". The food chain in other words. It was probably our first attempt for the profession to have "joined up" food safety considerations.
We took various aspects including:
- animal feed - what's in it
- health hazards on farms
- veterinary checks - added cost or added value
- utilising the VI centres better
- a survival kit for stock farming
- standards and profitability at the abattoir
- antimicrobial resistance
- food production - the manufacturer
- BSE controls on imports of beef
- the supermarket: the strongest link
Whilst it was a major session it didn't quite work as we had hoped because of the somewhat isolated or compartmentalised approach from different parts of the chain. That though is the challenge to overcome pieces of the chain and get around to joined up food production.
Animal identification has an important part to play in joining up the food chain and there are proposals for identification of animals in the future. Yet more change, yet more complications and yet more expense.
We were very pleased that Farming Today ran news coverage of BVA Congress in Winchester every day and indeed at the end of Congress a whole morning was devoted to our discussions.
Following in the footsteps of the Marsh report and before the OFT announcement we are informed from an EU Commission working party that all medicines for food animals should be classified POM. And so, in between these three initiatives over such a short space of time, we are rowing in completely different directions.
All these national matters are up in the air and up in the North of Scotland the Highlands and Islands Veterinary Services Scheme is also up in the air again. Funding finally agreed in 1996 is now outdated and we have to tackle that all over again.
1. Now turn to foot and mouth. The disease and its consequences has brought the rural community, agriculture, farmers and vets to their knees, both economically and physically.
STRATEGY
2. The starting point is a strategy for FMD control, then a plan and then action.
3. Back in the summer of 1996 when the profession was embroiled in the aftermath of the statement by Stephen Dorrell on BSE the BVA spelt out a strategy time and again. It was fourfold in its scope:
- eradication
- traceability
- enforcement
- verification
DISEASE
4. That strategy applies to the control of all animal diseases. It applies to foot and mouth. But there are differences in the manifestation of disease. In the case of foot and mouth, first the ferocity of the infection, second the scale and third the disposal of animals. It was for us all too quick, too widespread and too much.
PLANS
5. There are longstanding veterinary plans for controlling and eradicating foot and mouth. A plan existed for tackling an outbreak when things go right but what was missing was a plan for when things go wrong.
6. All plans have design assumptions - a worst case scenario i.e. the number of primary outbreaks in a specified time. But reality far exceeded the contingency plan. Veterinarians from many parts of the world who have helped and seen for themselves in the field have gone back to their countries and back to the drawing board to reassess their own plans. Internationally, our experience is viewed as unparalleled throughout the world.
SOURCE
7. In the first few days of the outbreak - Monday 19 to Thursday 22 February 2001 we spent too much time finding out where the disease came from rather than where it was going to. In an incredibly short space of time there was an explosion of infection via the largest sheep market in Europe which not only infected animals in the market but within hours we had thousands of sheep on wheels transported from the south of Scotland to the south of England//. The scatter bomb was primed days before the damage was evident.
INCIDENCE
8. The will to see a major problem through to a conclusion is often boosted by looking back to see how far we have come. We have come a very long way from a peak of over 50 outbreaks a day down to one.
9. We study the distribution curve for foot and mouth. Why is the escalation of the line so rapid and so steep and why does it take so long to tail to zero. Remember the strategy - eradication first. The area below the line should be as small as possible.// It is lack of traceability and lack of enforcement that has contributed to these circumstances.
MOVEMENT
10. But we must look to the future in a constructive fashion. Lessons have been learnt and these will translate into what has to be done in the future. Eradication of the disease is well on course.
11. But the weaknesses inherent in farming could still relight the fire. An isolated outbreak, miles from any other source, does not drop out of the sky. Disease moves, animals move, people move and vehicles move. All can carry the virus.
12. As the disease is eradicated the movement of animals will increase. Many thousands of animals are in the wrong place at the wrong time. We are facing autumn movements now, with winter movements and spring movements to come.
VACCINATION
13. The debate about vaccination must now start properly. Loose talk about vaccination is matched by ignorance of its effectiveness. Suitability for its usage both when and where and the influence of carriers are only a few major issues for consideration.
14. Foot and mouth disease is one of the most infectious diseases known to man. Vets and farmers that have seen the whole skin of the tongue come off like a glove from the hand know how debilitating the disease is.
TRACEABILITY
15. Traceability relies on identification to be effective. Even with an individual identity there is scope for mistakes, and fraud can drive a coach and horses through disease controls. The very fact that we don't know where sheep are is wholly unacceptable. The whole complex business of controlling movement of animals to control disease is diminished if traceability founders. The sheep industry has to take a careful look at the value of identification against the cost of production.
COMPLEXITY
16. The complexities of modern society have caused delays and exacerbated the spread of disease. The impact of the Environment Agency and the HSE on the disposal of carcasses has been substantial.
17. Under the new Government department DEFRA there must be a major improvement in how to act quickly to interpret law and reconcile policy and take decisive action. It's all under one roof now after all.//
MANPOWER
18. Whilst the disease was spreading so rapidly MAFF was recruiting veterinary manpower slowly. The call up was voluntary. The response was low key until the realisation of a national catastrophe.
19. A completely new approach to the deployment of private sector veterinarians is without question called for.
OVERHAUL
20. The BVA has been grappling with the problem of state work for a long time. Ministers, the State Veterinary Service and the BVA all agree. An overhaul is overdue. A fresh start is essential.
DEPENDENCE
21. We must look forward and recognise that events can change working practices dramatically. Less than one year ago some practices derived only 3% of their turnover from Ministry work. Now some of them derive 93%. The Government needs vets and vets need Government to ensure 'joined up' publicly funded animal health work.
STRUCTURE
22. The foot and mouth outbreak has brought home to us all the need for rapid mobilisation, organisation and decisive action. The key is a better structure linking the private practitioner and the relevant State Veterinary Service division.
SURVEILLANCE
23. Enforcement or lack of it applies to veterinary surveillance on the farm and to veterinary inspection at the abattoir. A debate on the future of veterinary surveillance in the UK was being conducted last year in a post-BSE climate rather than pre-FMD. But it is a bottomless pit when it comes to what could be done at whatever cost. Risk assessment has to be applied to a range of diseases and like the actuary a view taken on the level of surveillance or insurance required. Arriving at the right decision is not easy especially when existing plans for disease control can be exposed as somewhat irrelevant. What is clear however is that both active and passive surveillance are vital and therefore the practitioner has to visit farms one way or another to act as the "spotter". The practitioner visiting a farm is not only a spotter but can contribute to national surveillance and modelling. The incidence of scrapie in sheep is there to be tackled now.
VERIFICATION
24. Verification like enforcement applies across the whole spectrum of disease control. It is not simply a question of a signature on a piece of paper. At the scientific end we must look for improved diagnostic testing and validation of techniques.
25. At farm level and at the abattoir more vets have looked in more sheep's mouths than at any other time. Diagnosis of foot and mouth in sheep in difficult circumstances has not been easy. There must be a major ploughback of experience here to secure greater confidence for the future.
IMPORTS
26. Verification not only covers the farm to the abattoir, it also relates to imports and the veterinary role in the authentication of standards of production and the quality of animals and animal products. The horrific events in America point to a much wider dimension concerning the need for adequate controls on diseased imported food Terrorism could strike at people via food supplies as well as buildings. A major review of the conditions of import controls is called for and at the very least much more consideration given to the economic benefits of home production. The third Inquiry must address this fundamental issue.
VETERINARIANS
27. Lessons learnt is a catchphrase that seems to encourage a blame culture rather than provide future aims. Of course we want improved planning, more resources, better controls and no doubt the Inquiries and Government will have much to say over the next few months. But there is one theme that places the veterinary profession at the centre of decision making for the future - and that is the one involved at ground level. Knowledge of and experience gained in a locality is crucial.
CONCLUSION
28. The transfer of the knowledge up through a chain of command is vital and the use to which it is put is the test of veterinary integration. We have vets in the field, vets at regional level, at national level and at international level. We must strive to make better use of them in the overall strategy of eradication, traceability, enforcement and verification. We have called for an integrated national veterinary service before. We do so again now. Fragmentation has let us all down. As the disease hopefully is eradicated it is time for DEFRA and BVA, with its divisions, to sit down and enter a new era in public/private veterinary co-operation. We really cannot afford these {on screen} images again.
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