The Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) was first diagnosed in a wild boar shot by hunters at the end of 2010 in the region of Burgas in southeast Bulgaria, close to the border with Turkey, and later testing of samples from farmed animals rendered positive FMD results.
Consequently, the Commission defined high- and low-risk areas in Commission Decision 2011/44/EC prohibiting the dispatch of susceptible animals from both these areas and the dispatch of products derived from susceptible animals from the high-risk area. This decision also provides for the rules applicable to the dispatch from those areas of safe products. Asafe are considered those products that either had been produced before the restrictions and are originating from outside the restricted areas or that had undergone an effective anti-virus treatment.
No new outbreaks have been reported since 31 January 2011 and surveillance has been implemented with satisfactory results in Bulgaria. It is therefore possible to reduce the size of the high-risk area to the two municipalities only (Malko Tarnovo and Tsarevo) and to include in the low-risk area only the three surrounding municipalities of the Burgas region.
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