Bird Flu Drill at Government Lab Preceded Foot and Mouth Virus Outbreak
Bird Flu Drill at Government Lab Preceded Foot and Mouth Virus Outbreak [align=left] Itar-Tass
Monday Aug 6, 2007[/align]
The source of foot-and-mouth disease found in southern Britain is a U.S. pharmaceutical company, the Mail on Sunday weekly reported.
British specialists said the strain of food-and-mouth disease found in cattle on a farm in the county of Surry, was similar to the one used at a nearby laboratory.
The government-funded Institute for Animal Health's Pirbright Laboratory, which is studying the disease, is located some six kilometers from the affected farm.
A number of sources reported that it hosted an international drill last month during which live viruses of foot-and-mouth disease were used.
The virus was detected at one of the Surrey farms last Friday. All the 60 cattle were culled, and authorities have been checking other farms in close proximity.
The incubation period of this strain of the virus is three to five days.
Bird Flu Drill at Government Lab Preceded Foot and Mouth Virus Outbreak
Foot and Mouth Virus Released From Government Lab
Case mirrors 2001 outbreak, could signal new wave of agraterrorism against farming community Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet
Sunday, August 5, 2007
[align=left]Update: Russian news agency ITAR-TASS is reporting that the release of the virus came after an "international drill" last month that was held at Pirbright Laboratory, in which live virus was used. Real attacks are always shadowed by drills to provide culpable deniability.
The strain of foot and mouth disease that has put Britain on high alert has been identified as originating from a government laboratory which is shared with an American pharmaceutical company, mirroring the deadly outbreak of 2001 and potentially signaling a new wave of agraterrorism intended to cripple the farming community.
New Prime Minister Gordon Brown has chaired two Cobra emergency meetings and farmers nationwide have been ordered to halt movements of all livestock in response to the situation after after foot-and-mouth was confirmed at Wolford farm, near Guildford, on Friday night.
As was the case in 2001, when a vial of foot and mouth virus that was "stolen" from a government bio-weapons laboratory caused untold misery for thousands of farmers and devastated the industry, the origin of the latest outbreak traces directly back to a government research facility.
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[align=left] The strain in infected cattle is identical to that used for vaccines at the Institute for Animal Health at Pirbright, three miles from the farm,"
reports the BBC.
The strain was used in a vaccine batch manufactured on 16 July by a private pharmaceutical company Merial Animal Health.
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The firm shares Pirbright with the government's Institute for Animal Health (IAH), which conducts research into foot-and-mouth and where the strain is also present.
Whether the culprits are the pharmaceutical company or the government research lab, serious questions need to be asked about why routine levels of bio-security were not followed and how the virus managed to escape. Press speculation that the virus became airborne and got out through the air ducts doesn't comport with the basic composition of vaccines and how they would normally be stored.
Off limits: Six years ago, Tony Blair made most of the British countryside inaccessible as the rural areas were turned into giant quarantine zones.
For those who doubt the veracity of a British government plot to once again eviscerate the livelihoods of farmers (routinely the biggest power block opposing the Labour government) in an act of agraterrorism, they should carefully consider what happened in 2001. The Sunday Express reported that the foot and mouth virus was released deliberately out of Porton Down bio-weapons facility and could have possibly been the source of the outbreak two months later.
The disease spread like wildfire throughout the country as many accused the government of not doing nearly enough to contain it and the spring of 2001 in England was characterized by apocalyptic images of burning pyres dotted all over the countryside as over four million animals were slaughtered.
Coupled with reports of the government making inquiries to timber merchants and sign makers (before closing public footpaths), it is inconceivable that an animal rights activist, as we are led to believe, could have penetrated a level 4 bio-weapons facility that also houses anthrax and ebola and is protected by armed guards of the Ministry of Defence Police and the Military Provost Guard Service. The individual who stole the vial must have had full security clearance to enter the facility. Why would an animal rights activist release a virus that would kill four million animals?
Patricia Doyle, PhD also reported that Foot and Mouth exercises were being run by the British government immediately before the outbreak was made public.
Experts are saying that the current outbreak is likely to be localized and we can only hope it remains this way, because Brown won't hesitate to turn huge swathes of the country into quarantine zones as a dry run for martial law just as his predecessor Tony Blair did six years ago. [/align]
