About us

What we do

• Our Role
• Our day to day work
• Protecting public health
• Animal welfare and international trade
• Contingency planning and readiness for exotic disease outbreaks
• Emergencies
• Working with others
• The future
• History

We respond immediately to any suspicion of exotic animal disease reported to us by animal keepers or their vets, and experience tells us that a farmer’s own vet is often the first person and in the best place to spot the clinical signs. They are required to notify us of any suspicion straightaway, and we generally deal with several such calls each week by clinically inspecting and testing for disease as fast as possible and putting in place measures to stop any spread whilst we diagnose.

Commonly, these first suspicions are proved wrong, but occasionally they are not and when we find exotic disease we mobilise our resources nationally to stamp out the disease as fast as possible. In cases where the clinical picture clearly indicates exotic disease, the Chief Veterinary Officer can authorise us to proceed on suspicion, in the interests of disease control.

In the event of an exotic disease outbreak, Animal Health has the lead role in the field but we work closely with others, most especially the Chief Veterinary Officer and her team, local authorities, the police and for some diseases, the Health Protection Agency.

The precise control measures for each disease are different, but they generally involve securing the place where the animals are – the Infected Premises – to stop movement of the disease, and stamping out the disease on the Infected Premises.

We establish control zones around the Infected Premises and impose special measures in those zones. Again, it depends on the nature of the disease but these measures usually involve restrictions on the movement of animals and clinical inspection. For some diseases – foot and mouth for example – we impose national measures immediately to contain spread.

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