2026-01-29

25. Deputy Martin Kenny asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if there are adequate amounts of bluetongue vaccine here to carry out a vaccine programme in the spring, if needed; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6708/26]

This question is on the bluetongue outbreak. We saw yesterday that three more farms have been found to have animals with bluetongue. It is a very serious problem and a lot of farmers are very concerned. What is missing from all of this is that we do not know what the plan is. I appreciate we will have a meeting with members of the agriculture committee in respect of this after these questions. We do not know what the plan is. We know that vaccines have been approved. Are there stocks of them? What will happen as we move forward? Where did this come from? That is one of the big questions a lot of farmers have and it is their real concern. What do they need to watch for? How do animals get infected?

The positive case was found last week due to stringent routine investigations and testing of a culled cow that had been slaughtered. Antibodies were found, which showed the culled cow had been infected with bluetongue virus, BTV-3, last year on a farm in Wexford. We went in with our follow-up tracing and testing of all of the animals on that farm and the contiguous farm surrounding it. As of yesterday, unfortunately, we are up to 11 positive cases across that farm and three neighbouring farms. There are 11 positive cases on four farms. We were monitoring all last summer. I pay tribute to farmers for their surveillance and to our private veterinary practitioners for how they all work with our regional veterinary officer teams from the Department. We worked well to do our best on surveillance last year, when it was rampant across Europe and the UK, to keep this disease off the island until now. It is unwelcome but it is not hugely surprising. We were monitoring wind activity and the risk of this blowing over in warm weather. Midges are the vector for spreading this disease from animal to animal. They are likely to be blown over in the wind from Wales and France in the warm weather, and that is most likely where it came from. We have responded in real time. Our approach was always to identify this early, lock it down and try to eradicate it. We have lost our disease-free status. It is important to reassure the public that there are no human health or food safety concerns with this disease. It is very much a production disease but it is a big cause of concern for farmers. Some of their animals will get sick from it and there are trade implications now that we have lost our disease-free status. We have lost our beef access to China, which I announced yesterday. We have been working with third countries over the past two years to reform our veterinary health certificates we will continue to do so.

I thank the Minister and I appreciate all of the work that has been done. When I ask where it came from, there is the monitoring of the wind but we are in the winter and the weather is very cold. The likelihood of it coming from midges blown across the Irish Sea is probably minimal, I expect. How much investigation of this has been done? A lot of straw is being imported. Could the disease come with midges in the straw? These are the kinds of questions farmers ask me. People are perplexed that it is here at this time of the year. While I doubt it is the case, is there a connection with the outbreak in County Down before Christmas? That is very unlikely seeing as the cases were in two opposite ends of the country. People would like to get information in respect of this. We tell farmers to be vigilant but what do they need to be vigilant for? This is really what we need to focus on. The Minister did not get to speak about the vaccines and where that is at. Perhaps we will hear about it at the meeting later.

I focused on one part of the question. I will respond now on the vaccines. The first animal that tested positive did so for antibodies, which proved the culled cow had it last year. As we know, midge activity can only spread disease when the temperature is over a constant 12°C, so we are really in the high-risk period from April or May until October. This animal had it last year and did not present symptoms. The other ten animals that have tested positive since are not displaying symptoms. Many of them tested positive for the antibodies, which means they had it last year. An animal is only infectious for approximately 60 days but it retains the antibodies. When we test we can see they had it last year but they did not present symptoms. Most do present symptoms, and when we ask farmers to be vigilant what we are saying is that if an animal is sick or if farmers see unusual behaviour, they should contact their private vet. The private vets are completely plugged in with our regional veterinary officers and beyond. I am out of time again but I have a reply on the vaccines and I will provide it in the response to the next supplementary question.

I thank the Minister. I want to follow up a little on this. Obviously, these are animals that probably got infected last summer. This will concern many in the agricultural community. Does this mean there are animals on a lot of farms around the country that contracted it last summer but it was not identified, they presented no symptoms and it will only be when they go to the factory and a test is done that it will be found? This is a big concern I have learned about this morning from the Minister. I was not aware of that before now, and I am sure a lot of people were not either. With regard to the spreading of the disease, we are in cold weather now but climate change is probably at the root of a lot of this. With the weather getting warmer, we will see a lot more of these diseases, which have probably been confined to hotter climates, starting to move up. This will be an issue as we move forward. We could get a couple of weeks in March when temperatures are 15°C or 16°C. What will happen then? That is the issue we need to focus on and it is where the vaccine comes into play.

It is not as big a concern that an animal had it here last year. A number of animals displaying antibodies now, showing they had it last year, gives us the concern that midges in that area were infected with it last year. These midges are lying dormant at present. Will some of them still have the disease when the temperature goes back up to spread it? That is the real concern. This disease is not passed from animal to animal. It is passed through a midge landing and biting an infected animal and then biting another animal. That is how it is spreading across Europe and beyond. It is fair to say that the response in January is very different from what our response would be if we were in July. The fact is that an animal is only infectious for 60 days, so an animal testing positive now will not cause the disease to spread through a midge landing on it because by the time the temperature gets warmer, the animal will no longer be infectious. In terms of the vaccine, we changed our approach. Our approach was always to identify it and move in quickly. If we vaccinate, we mask the disease because we cannot tell the difference between a positive test result and a vaccinated animal. Late last year, when the disease appeared in Northern Ireland, I approved vaccines for this year. That was a commercial decision. I ask people to engage with their veterinary practitioners to see whether vaccines are suitable for them.

With the permission of the House, I will go back to Question No. 8.