- guardian.co.uk, Sunday April 22 2001 01.03 BST
Actress Joanna Lumley told a crowd of several hundred animal rights protesters outside Downing Street that the public had been misled over the possibilities for halting the outbreak. The Absolutely Fabulous star demanded an immediate end of the mass slaughter policy, which has led to the culling of almost a million and a half animals, and a start to vaccination. The Government last week agreed that vaccination was the best option but refrained from introducing it because of opposition from the National Farmers' Union.
And in The Hague, thousands of people were also demonstrating against the European Union and Dutch government policies of mass slaughter. They protested at the 'immoral' culling of healthy animals, and the authorities' refusal to start a comprehensive vaccination programme.
In Gloucestershire, 30 protesting villagers saw off Maff slaughtermen from Homestead farm in Lydbrook. The farm's 19 sheep have been kept indoors since the start of the outbreak, and on Wednesday were confirmed by ministry vets as being healthy. However, the vets returned to the farm yesterday to carry out an 'experimental cull', but backed down in the face of local protests.
Other developments in the outbreak include:
• 500 sheep were unnecessarily slaughtered in Cumbria after officials made an error with a grid reference. Government slaughtermen insisted on killing the sheep despite the farmer's protests that they were not in a culling area.
• More than 400,000 animals slaughtered to help control the spread of foot and mouth are to be buried at a site in Devon, despite strong protests from locals about the risk of water contamination.
•A farmers' leader warned of a possible new flare-up of foot and mouth as cattle were released from their winter barns into pasture, where they may come into contact with infected sheep. Michael Hart, chairman of the Small and Family Farms Alliance, described the sheep as 'woolly time bombs waiting to go off'.
