Originally from: Farmtalking
                        
Aujeszky's Six

http://www.thepigsite.com/LatestNews/Default.asp?AREA=LatestNews&Display=3875

"Aujeszky's scare has been mishandled from start to finish" –

Abattoir chief

UK

– Following the "Aujeszky's Six" scare, which set alarm bells ringing in Europe, Paul Cheale is questioning whether it is possible for abattoirs to continue cooperating with Defra.

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"It was clear from the outset that this was a laboratory error, and we explained as much to Defra," he said.

"The next thing we knew, they had sent out a press release and the media was full of disease-scare stories. It could have been a huge PR disaster in Europe. We're lucky our customers didn't cancel all orders on the spot."

When continental customers of British pigmeat called Cheale Meats to find out what was happening, Paul Cheale had to explain it was an error "by the same ministry that got sheep and cow brains mixed up".

The six suspected cases were:

One on March 15;
One on June 7;
Four on May 29.
"After a decade of negative results it was impossible that on one day four positives should turn up from Sussex to Yorkshire," said Paul Cheale. "When Defra phoned us we told them to check the common factor in all this – the laboratory.

But on the same day, Defra issued a press release announcing six serological positive results for Aujeszky's.

"Imagine our horror when we saw on television and read in the nationals such reports as RABIES PIGS DISCOVERED IN FOOT AND MOUTH ABATTOIR, all naming Cheale Meats."

The Aujeszky's Six debacle raises serious questions, he says. "Why, when an abattoir cooperates with Defra in a national surveillance scheme is its identity not confidential?

"And couldn't anyone have used some commonsense before slapping Form As on the unfortunate producers concerned, who immediately became victims too."

Five of the Form A farms had now been cleared but a sixth, in Shropshire, was still awaiting clearance because of an unidentified virus. Some producers believe Defra's handling of the Aujeszky's Six was a smokescreen to help convince the sheep sector of a continuing need for a 20-day movement restriction.

NPA producer group agreed at their meeting yesterday that although the scare over the Aujeszky's Six had been groundless, it would be sensible for NPA to send a working party to Northern Ireland to check that safeguards in place to stop Aujeszky's arriving in Britain.

Source: National Pig Association – 11th July 2002