Vets renewed their concerns that disease surveillance activities may be hit by a dramatic cut in the number of post-mortem centres in England and Wales.
The British Veterinary Association said last night the confirmation of changes by the AHVLA animal health and veterinary laboratory agency threw up challenges and possible risks.
The quango had earlier said it would halve the number of centres from 14 to seven next year and axe another unit in 2015. It will, however, retain its specialist poultry facility at Lasswade, near Edinburgh.
AHVLA said its new approach would improve both the geographical and species specific coverage in England and Wales by making better use of the expertise and resources of private vets, universities and the livestock sector.
It added: “The new system will place a greater emphasis on gathering intelligence from other sources of surveillance intelligence, and places less emphasis on post-mortems carried out at government laboratories. For example, large numbers of post-mortems are already carried out in the poultry sector and some private vets perform post-mortems on-farm. Better co-ordination of these alternative sources of intelligence will provide a more comprehensive threat picture to be drawn than is presently the case.”
AHVLA veterinary surveillance director Rupert Hine said the current system had a good record of detecting diseases, including Schmallenberg and bluetongue.
But BVA president Robin Hargreaves said any changes to the veterinary surveillance system must not be based on cost alone. “The cost of a disease outbreak far outweighs the cost of providing a robust surveillance system,” said Mr Hargreaves, who acknowledged the positive elements of the change including the focus on data collection, the retention of expert capacity and a desire to increase access to the remaining facilities in England and Wales. But he also pointed to there being known risks. “The announcement raises many questions and challenges that will need to be addressed as we receive more detail on the plans,” he added.
Mr Hargreaves said the changes must not create a disincentive for farmers to make use of post-mortem facilities. Veterinary practices also needed to see the value in investing in the additional training requirements to provide services.
The changes south of the border come as Scotland reviews its veterinary surveillance centres. A report by former NFU Scotland president John Kinnaird recommended exactly two years ago a phased reduction in the eight centres run by rural college SRUC at Aberdeen, Ayr, Dumfries, Edinburgh, Inverness, Perth, St Boswells and Thurso.
A group was set up in March 2012 to oversee the reforms to Scotland’s animal disease surveillance, but its findings have still not been published.