Expert finds foot and mouth in Cyprus: minister

By Michele Kambas

NICOSIA (Reuters) - Cyprus's agriculture minister said on Monday a European Union expert had confirmed an outbreak of foot and mouth disease at two farms on the Mediterranean island.

Final results were not expected from a European Union lab in Britain until later on Monday, but a Dutch veterinary expert confirmed the authorities' worst fears, Agriculture Minister Photis Photiou told Reuters.

"The EU expert who arrived visited the two farms this morning and has confirmed there is an outbreak," Photiou said.

"This is a very bad situation. We are a very small country and all farms are next to each other. It will be a big disaster for these people (farmers)," he said.

Authorities on Monday morning culled up to 300 goats and sheep from the two farms in the southern district of Larnaca, a farming intensive area dotted with pig and cattle farms.

If necessary authorities would extend the cull, Photiou said. "We have already killed 300 animals, but we don't know how far we have to go."

A foot and mouth outbreak will inevitably lead to restrictions on Cyprus's meat exports.

Cyprus has not experienced an outbreak of foot and mouth, which is devastating to livestock, since 1963.

The disease is usually harmless to humans, but extremely dangerous to many animals, including cows, pigs and sheep, which develop blisters on their hooves, foam at the mouth and collapse. The virus is highly contagious and spreads easily with the wind.

Local reports have suggested that anything between 100,000 and 160,000 animals were at risk.

Around 15,000 animals were in the risk zone of 3 km around the two farms, and 150,000 in a broader 10-km zone, Photiou said.

Agriculture, including farming, represents about 2.8 percent of Cyprus's gross domestic product. The island is generally self-sufficient in its meat and dairy products and exports pork.

Authorities were puzzled at an apparent false alarm in late October, when tests on another flock of sheep showing suspect symptoms came up positive, but EU test results were negative.

Vets maintained a quarantine over the first suspect farm because of the discrepancy, and extended it after a flock at a second farm 500 meters away showed symptoms late last week.

"Nobody knows how it reached Cyprus. There are a lot of scenarios, a lot of suspicion, but we cannot know," Photiou told reporters earlier.