DUBAI, Saudi Arabia (Reuters) — Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates reported March 14 that they had 10 cases of foot-and-mouth disease.
These are the first cases found in the Persian Gulf states, which import most of their meat.
UAE agriculture minister Saeed al-Ragabani said eight imported cows were found to have foot-and-mouth, a newspaper reported. Livestock imports now require prior approval, he said.
The official Saudi Press Agency reported two calves had been diagnosed with the disease in neighboring Saudi Arabia, which has set up a national committee to fight its spread. The two calves were in the northwestern province of Yanbu, it said.
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Ragabani said the UAE cases were “limited and contained,” adding that it was not yet clear from where the cows were imported.
“Most of our imports are from Australia,” he said.
Peter Milne, president of the Cattle Council of Australia, said it was not possible that Australian cattle carried the disease to Gulf countries.
Australia has not had foot-and-mouth disease since 1872, he said.
Livecorp, Australia’s live cattle export body, said it had exported only two head of cattle to the UAE in 2000 and no exports had taken place since then.
The UAE has banned livestock imports from European Union countries and 11 African states.
Cases of foot-and-mouth have also been detected in Argentina, Turkey, Iran, Colombia and Mongolia.
In UAE’s Dubai emirate, municipality director-general Qassim Sultan told the official news agency WAM that the “city is free from any animals or meats afflicted by foot-and-mouth disease.”
A senior UAE quarantine official said tough measures already in place would eliminate any risk from the viral disease at the $6 million Dubai World Cup horse race on March 24.
Kuwait said it was free from foot-and-mouth disease and that it had taken tough preventative measures.
The Saudi Press Agency said Saudi Arabia had extended a ban on imports of beef and mutton from Lebanon and Turkey to include India, Iran and Taiwan.
The kingdom, which imports most of its beef requirement of 100,000 tonnes a year, had already banned beef and mutton from EU countries over an earlier health scare.
