At 10:37 01/10/2003 +0100, you wrote:

I do 'recall' Andrew vividly. I also recall people asking for help and help
in any quantity. Surely something is better then nothing, which is what
they received in the end.

No -because all USDA wanted was to conduct field tests with a couple of machines – ie. 'play' with their new toys – that would NOT have impacted the course of the epidemic or how it was handled in any way.

Yes, it would have enabled collection of some useful data in relation to USDA desire to have field data to help with approvals of such systems but at a time when all and sundry were rushing around like headless chickens it would have at best been a distraction and a time when Pirbright was working flat out to radically increase lab capacity for tests that were already accepted and approved.

But how many machines were readily available. And one doesn't usually have
the luxury of deploying novel technology in the face of an epidemic which
one is already struggling to cope with due to insufficient adequately
trained/knowledgeable folk on the ground.

Strange we manage to cover all of that Andrew when we send our troops to
war. Field hospitals, drugs, you name it this Government well any
Government can come up with the goods then, if and when needed. No matter
how shorter a notice the troops are sent in at.

The Army maintains training, equipment and a state of readiness – UK was NOT prepared to handle an FMD epidemic. As we know FMD plans, etc. had 'lapsed' in the face of BSE and SF. Of course it also costs a LOT of money to maintain the military – how much are countries prepared to spend – and gis from general taxation which might otherwise be spent on such things as healthcare and education etc – to maintain a constant state of readiness in case of an occasional outbreak of an exotic disease – history suggests not very much.

Simple truth is they did
not want a way of testing did they?

You would have thought that seeing how
all on the ground were struggling to cope and seeing as many did not even
know what they were looking for – that ANY test would have been grabbed.

Had there been a quick, simple and cheap and reliable test that could rapidly be deployed on a large scale then I'm sure they would have grabbed it – there wasn't and there isn't.

To alleviate the backlog of cattle to bury and destroy and to help the
VETS etc
who had NO idea what they were looking for.

It's not true to say people had No idea what they were looking for – what is true is that it's hard to definitively diagnose Type O FMD in sheep from clinical signs alone.

It's also true that the group of biomathematicians from Imperial College who prevailed in promoting the 24/48 plan to Govt – the so called contiguous cull – NEVER factored in the logistics (nor costs, financial and social) of handling the resulting dead animals. That was inexcusable. Had those factors been given even cursory consideration one doubts that the policy would have been adopted.

Andrew