Another FMD case detected just before quarantine restrictions are lifted... Additional outbreak at a cattle farm in Ganghwa, Incheon

[Financial News]  Another case of foot-and-mouth disease has been confirmed at a cattle farm in Ganghwa County, Incheon. It was detected during testing conducted to lift movement restrictions around a previously affected farm, prompting quarantine authorities to significantly step up preventive measures.

The Central Disaster Management Headquarters (CDMH) said on the 28th that surveillance testing at a farm raising 23 cattle in Ganghwa County, Incheon, found three animals positive for the foot-and-mouth disease antigen.
The farm is located within the 3-km quarantine zone around farms in Ganghwa County where foot-and-mouth disease was confirmed on the 16th and 19th of last month, and had been subject to movement restrictions and other controls. The latest case was detected during surveillance testing to make a final safety check ahead of lifting the quarantine zone’s restrictions.
With this additional infection, the nationwide number of foot-and-mouth disease cases this year has risen to 15: nine in Yecheon, North Gyeongsang Province; two in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province; and four in Ganghwa, Incheon. Foot-and-mouth disease is a contagious illness affecting cloven-hoofed animals such as cattle and pigs, and can cause symptoms including loss of appetite and a sharp drop in milk production.
To prevent the disease from spreading, the CDMH has urgently sent an initial response team and an epidemiological investigation team to the farm and is fully controlling access by outsiders and vehicles. It plans to cull the three infected animals immediately and, if additional infections are found in subsequent detailed and clinical tests, to expand the partial culling operation.

Quarantine authorities are mobilizing all available resources to prevent further spread. As a first step, 33 pieces of equipment, including wide-area disinfection sprayers, will be deployed to carry out intensive disinfection and cleaning at cloven-hoofed livestock farms and livestock facilities and vehicles in Ganghwa County, Incheon, and neighboring Gimpo City, Gyeonggi Province.
Authorities will also designate and operate the period from the 29th through the 4th of next month as ‘Nationwide Coordinated Intensive Disinfection Week.’ During this period, they will carry out extensive disinfection at cloven-hoofed livestock farms and livestock vehicles across the country, while checking all cattle farms nationwide for animals that missed their foot-and-mouth disease vaccinations and arranging catch-up shots.
A CDMH official described it as ‘a grave situation, with another foot-and-mouth disease case reported in Ganghwa, Incheon, an area where cases had already occurred,’ and urged relevant agencies and local governments to ‘make every effort to conduct surveillance at livestock farms and carry out intensive disinfection, and especially ensure that farms in affected areas thoroughly implement preventive measures so that no vaccinations are missed.’
[email protected] Park Ji-hyun Reporter