Northern Ireland’s Minister for Agriculture, Ms Bríd Rogers, has ruled out a widespread vaccination against foot-and-mouth despite the increased threat from Britain.
Speaking on Ulster Television last night Ms Rogers said the negative implications for trade of a mass vaccination scheme were too great.
She said vaccination would only be considered as a "measure of last resort" in the case of an epidemic.
It is understood that many countries would refuse to accept meat exports which contained the strain of a vaccine.
A spokesman for Northern Ireland’s Agricultural department told ireland.com the policy would continue to be that of "ring-fencing, culling and detoxification like in the Republic."
Meanwhile a senior government adviser in Britain has called for a pilot vaccination scheme against the disease so the country can be better prepared to tackle the disease in the future.
Chairman of the Countryside Agency, Mr Ewen Cameron, who today launched the biggest survey so far of the impact of the disease, said the British public would not tolerate the slaughter of livestock on such a large scale again.
The Countryside Agency report says the current foot-and-mouth crisis is threatening the entire fabric of rural life, and has so far cost the overall economy about £4 billion sterling.
