Suspected foot-and-mouth spreads in Britain
Tuesday, April 24, 2001 05:32 PM EDT
LONDON, Apr 24, 2001 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Two more
suspected cases of human's contracting foot-and-mouth disease were reported
Tuesday by British health officials as they awaited results of tests on a
slaughterman who may have contracted the virus from an exploding animal carcass.
If confirmed, the cases would be the first involving humans in Britain in 35
years, although the infection has occasionally, if rarely, crossed the species
barrier into humans elsewhere in Europe, Asia and Africa.
"Two more cases have been referred to us," said a spokesman for the Public
Health Laboratory Service, "and we are investigating them. There are a lot of
symptoms that can seem similar to foot-and-mouth, and the case yesterday
(Monday) has obviously raised concerns."
Medical experts said foot-and-mouth in humans is very mild, with victims
suffering flu-like symptoms and blisters on hands and in the mouth. Full
recovery takes a few weeks.
"Foot-and-mouth in humans is very rare," a spokesman for the Department of
Health said, "but it can occur. It is a mild disease in humans."
The first suspected human victim in the current epidemic raging across Britain
is an unidentified slaughterman in Cumbria, in north England. Results of tests
in his case should be available Wednesday, health officials said.
A spokesman for Prime Minister Tony Blair said: "My understanding is that he was
moving the decomposing carcass of a cow, when that carcass exploded, and the
fluid went into his mouth."
No details were available immediately in the two new suspected cases, although
authorities said they were not in north Cumbria. Experts also said there were no
recorded cases of human-to-human transmission of the disease.
"As we have said throughout," Blair's spokesman stressed, "there is no health
risk to the general population."
Before this epidemic, the only previous recorded case of human foot-and-mouth
was Robert Brewis, an agricultural salesman who contracted the disease in 1966.
He recovered with no serious after-effects, medical officials said.
But "basically," said Angus Nichol, director of the communicable diseases
surveillance unit at the Public Health Laboratory Service, "this is an animal
virus. It doesn't like human beings."
Copyright 2001 by United Press International.
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