A WIDER bluetongue control and protection zone has come into force after the number of cases of the disease rose to 11 - all of which are in Suffolk.A new control zone comprising parts of Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire was announced just after midnight yesterday.
A WIDER bluetongue control and protection zone has come into force after the number of cases of the disease rose to 11 - all of which are in Suffolk.
A new control zone comprising parts of Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire was announced just after midnight yesterday.
The protection zone also includes London and parts of Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Hertfordshire, Kent, Surrey, East Sussex and West Sussex.
Different movement restrictions apply within the zones, mainly to the movement of cattle.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) 11 cases were within the existing bluetongue control zone with 10 in a cluster around the Ipswich area and the 11th at Lound, near Lowestoft.
Rachel Carrington, of the NFU in East Anglia, said “a number” of other potential bluetongue cases were being investigated.
She added: “The majority of reports are being received in Suffolk but there have been unconfirmed cases in Norfolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and the East Midlands.”
The news came after the Prime Minister Gordon Brown indicated farmers affected by the bluetongue outbreak would receive help - financial or otherwise - from the Government.
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