Britain announced the "safety-first" slaughter of thousands of apparently healthy animals today as it stepped up its fight against the foot-and-mouth virus.
As the tally for the number of cases in Britain hit 241, Agriculture Minister Mr Nick Brown said, in certain areas, livestock within a three-kilometre radius of an infected site would be culled.
"This is a policy of safety first," Mr Brown said. "We are intensifying the slaughter of animals at risk in those areas of the country, thankfully still limited, where the disease has spread."
He also said he was considering easing restrictions in disease-free areas, in response to complaints from unaffected farmers and the tourism industry who complained their business was being damaged.
The expanded slaughter programme would mean that "well over" 100,000 animals, mostly sheep, would be culled, on top of the 205,000 animals that have been killed or are awaiting slaughter, Mr Brown said.
He said he did not know what the exact figure would be, saying only it would be "a substantial number of animals".
The measure is intended to target animals which, although showing no symptoms of the disease, could have come into contact with infected animals and be incubating it.
There were ten new cases of foot and mouth confirmed this afternoon. All were in areas that have already been contaminated by the infection.
Yesterday's tally of 26 new infected sites was the highest daily total since the outbreak started on February 20th.
AFP