Austria to shut border crossings to Hungary, Slovakia over foot and mouth, thousands of animals culled

Francois Murphy
Reuters
Thu, 03 Apr 2025 00:00 UTC

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Slovakia borders

Austria will close two smaller crossings at its border with Slovakia and 21 at its border with Hungary from Saturday, in a bid to prevent foot-and-mouth disease from entering the country, the Interior Ministry said on Thursday.

The first outbreak of the highly infectious disease in 50 years in Hungary led the country on Wednesday to deploy soldiers and launch disinfection measures to contain it in an area bordering Slovakia and Austria.

The disease, which poses no danger to humans, mostly affects cattle and other cloven-hoofed animals like swine, sheep and goats, causing fever and mouth blisters. Outbreaks often lead to trade restrictions and culls of some livestock.

Slovakia declared an emergency situation on Tuesday after the disease was found on three farms.

To strengthen efforts aimed at preventing the disease from reaching Austria, the country will focus its police resources at those borders on its main crossings, the ministry said in a statement.

"So as not to undermine these police checks, we ask you to understand that we cannot provide further details, particularly the times, staffing levels, form of checks etc at the various locations," the ministry said.

Comment: The Express reported further:

The highly infectious disease was found in a Hungarian dairy farm in Kisbajcs, close to the Slovakian border, with 1,372 animals at risk. Authorities deployed soldiers and implemented immediate health control measures, including the culling of livestock and introducing a restricted zone. Slovakia confirmed outbreaks on March 21 in farms close to the Hungarian border, a region important for Slovakian livestock production, and the EU Veterinary Emergency Team was deployed immediately.

[...]

At the few open border crossings with Hungary and Slovakia, cars must cross over an epidemic mat to prevent the virus from spreading, which also applies to pedestrians crossing the border on foot.

Several countries have banned imports of cattle, pigs, meat, dairy, and animal by-products from Hungary and Slovakia. Swinehealth.org described the measures taken to limit the spread.

The entire infected first herd (1,400 cattle) was culled. Hungary established a 3km protection zone and a 10km surveillance zone, extending into Slovakia. For the second outbreak, culling of infected cattle is anticipated to be completed soon, mandatory culling of pigs in the affected areas by March 31 due to their potential role in virus transmission, and grazing restrictions enforced along a 10 km strip near the border to prevent further spread.

Reportedly, "locals organised several protests, asking authorities to allow the quarantine and testing of healthy animals within the protection zone."