The situation

Emergency preparedness for foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) remains a core issue for European Veterinary Authorities, as an entry of FMD continues to be a risk for the region, and the consequences would be devastating. The majority of European countries have not faced an FMD incursion, for many decades, and therefore lack direct experience in dealing with such a situation.  As cattle, small ruminants, pigs and even wildlife may be involved in a potential epidemic, there are no direct comparator diseases. Therefore, we need to be able to simulate what may happen in an epidemic for a better understanding of the consequences. This will help developing improved contingency plans and appropriate training, equipping, and exercising. In this context, a modeling tool for infectious animal diseases could be useful to support preparedness planning for the effective control of a potential outbreak.

What is the model?

The EuFMD has promoted the development of EuFMDiS, which is a multi-country Foot-and-mouth disease spread simulation model. The model is an adaptation of the Australian Animal Disease Spread Model (AADIS) developed by Graeme Garner & Richard Bradhurst.  

EuFMDiS is a powerful, robust, and flexible modelling tool that allows countries to evaluate their preparedness , the completeness of their contingency plans and the impact of control measures. This model can be used to evaluate various control options (such as impacts of movement restrictions, vaccination strategies, etc.) to eradicate the disease. It can also evaluate available resource and vaccine supply issues. EuFMDiS is developed with the collaboration of seven central European countries pilot countries which are Italy, Austria, Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Slovenia. EuFMDiS has now also been implemented in Ireland, Spain, North Macedonia, and Denmark with a stand-alone version. The model development (and/or data collection) is underway for Baltic countries (Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia). In addition, EuFMD is working to integrate new features (such as biosecurity and wildlife component, rendering capacity, post-outbreak management, etc.). As per workplan, the EuFMDiS model will be extended to other FAST diseases such as PPR and sheep and goat pox. In future, EuFMDis can be extended to a pan-European modelling environment.