Brown returns from holiday over foot and mouth

London, Aug 4: Prime Minister Gordon Brown returned from holiday to chair an emergency meeting today about the outbreak of foot and mouth disease on a British farm.

The discovery of the disease near London prompted the government yesterday to ban livestock movements to prevent a repeat of a 2001 outbreak that blighted farming and rural tourism. All cattle on the farm were being culled.

Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair, was criticised for his government's handling of the last outbreak, particularly for failing to act swiftly to stop the movement of animals.

Last evening, Brown took part in an emergency meeting of officials by telephone from Dorset, where he was on holiday, and he returned to London to chair another meeting of the emergency committee, COBRA, today.

Leading microbiologist Hugh Pennington said Britain was better placed to deal with the latest outbreak.

''We've got the administrative structures, we've got the infrastructure and we've got the scientific capability,'' Professor Hugh Pennington told the BBC.

''All these things were tested and found to be wanting in 2001. Lessons have been learned and I'm confident we'll do much, much better this time.'' The 2001 foot and mouth scare turned into one of the world's largest and most expensive animal disease outbreaks, with overall costs estimated at up to 12 billion euros ( billion).

Authorities slaughtered 6.5 million animals in Britain and burned them on funeral pyres to stem the spread of the disease, turning much of the countryside into a no-go zone, rather than use vaccines. France, Ireland and the Netherlands were also hit.

''To have this hanging over us is dark day for British farming,'' National Farmers' Union president Peter Kendall told the BBC. ''The government has reacted well in immediately restricting and banning all movements.

''People have to understand that last time the delay occurred caused the further spread. Going through short-term inconvenience now is a price worth paying if we can keep this to a single location.'' Foot and mouth disease causes high fevers and blisters in cloven-hoofed animals and can often lead to death. It can be contracted by cattle, pigs, sheep and goats, and very rarely by people.

The disease can be carried on the wheels of vehicles, in livestock units and on shoes and boots, officials said. They said it was too soon to say how the cattle in the latest outbreak had become infected.

REUTERS>