Britain on Friday set up a new surveillance zone after cattle in a second area several kilometers away from an initial outbreak site developed symptoms of foot and mouth disease.
Like the two outbreaks confirmed last week, the new surveillance site is a 3-km exclusion zone around a farm in the southern England county of Surrey and is also kilometers away from the Pirbright laboratory southwest of London.
Debby Reynolds, Britain's chief veterinarian confirmed the second zone was in the same county of Surrey, but did not specify exactly where it was in relation to the initial control zone. He said the new zone was a "developing disease situation."
It is expected to take around 24 hours to prove whether the cattle in the new zone has infected the foot and mouth disease.
The strain of the initial foot-and-mouth disease outbreaks is not one normally found in animals but is used in vaccine production and in diagnostic laboratories. It is proved be identical to that used at the Institute for Animal Health at Pirbright.
British health authorities said there was a "strong probability" that the outbreak originated at the Pirbright laboratory and was spread by human movement.
Pirbright complex houses vaccine-maker Merial Animal Health, the British arm of U.S.-French Merial Ltd and Britain's Institute of Animal Health.
Foot-and-mouth disease does not typically infect humans, but affects cattle with symptoms including fever, lesions in the mouth and lameness.
Several countries, including the United States, have banned imports of British livestock and Britain has voluntarily suspended exports of livestock, meat and milk products and destroyed more than 570 cows since the outbreak was spotted last week.
Source: Xinhua
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