Tales from Europe's Stricken Livestock Farms

It's causing more than just culls and quarantines on the farms of Europe. The foot-and-mouth epidemic is also spreading fear and despair to farm families who are watching helplessly as their livestock — and livelihoods — literally go up in smoke. Even in countries and regions that are so far disease-free, the virus frightens farmers and changes the way they manage their flocks and fields. Here are personal stories of life — and death — on three European farms.

FRANCE:
'It was as if they'd located a serial killer'

For Francis Gagnon, the arrival of foot-and- mouth disease in France has been a saga of bureaucracy and needless slaughter. On March 16, some 40 armed police and 18 veterinary workers in white coats and rubber boots showed up at 6:45 a.m. on his farm in the Burgundy village of Tannerre-en-Puisaye. After police sealed off the farm, the men in white entered his barn and systematically injected a fast-acting poison into more than 833 of his sheep, many of them newborn lambs and heavily pregnant ewes. "No one could move without permission," says Gagnon. "Everyone was carefully watched, and there were even two helicopters flying overhead monitoring all movement. It was as if they'd located an escaped serial killer." Full Story...