{"id":614618,"date":"2026-09-04T20:28:17","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T20:28:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/614618\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T20:28:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T20:28:17","slug":"case-of-bluetongue-virus-identified-in-co-wexford-cattle-herd-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/614618\/","title":{"rendered":"Case of bluetongue virus identified in Co Wexford cattle herd \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A case of the bluetongue virus has been found in a cattle herd in Co Wexford<\/a>, the Department of Agriculture<\/a> has said.<\/p>\n

The disease, spread by midges, has a high mortality rate among animals but does not affect humans. It can cause severe illness in livestock and deformities in newborns. <\/p>\n

In January, the State\u2019s first confirmed case<\/a> of the disease was recorded in Co Wexford. It led to China suspending imports<\/a> of Irish beef. The disease is not contagious, but a midge that bites an infected animal will spread it to the next animal it bites.<\/p>\n

Regarding the latest case, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine said on Friday that an unvaccinated 16-month-old heifer had tested positive for bluetongue virus serotype 3 (BTV-3) during a postmortem. It said no clinical signs were detected before the animal\u2019s death and this was \u201cthe first case of BTV-3 detected in Ireland where infection occurred in 2026\u201d. <\/p>\n

The department said the case highlighted \u201cthe importance of submitting unexplained mortalities\u201d to its regional veterinary laboratories. It said farmers who have not vaccinated their herds should talk to their veterinary practitioner as it is the most effective measure in protecting against the disease. <\/p>\n

\u201cBTV-3 is currently circulating extensively in Great Britain,\u201d the department said. \u201cThere are reports of multiple cases with a variety of clinical signs including mortalities in cattle and sheep, with cases remaining concentrated in southwest England and Wales. There also has been recent detections in Scotland.\u201d <\/p>\n

Bluetongue is so called because one of the signs can be swollen mouths and tongues. If that symptom does not occur, many of the other effects, such as fever, loss of appetite, drop in milk yield and lameness, are similar to other diseases, making diagnosis not immediately obvious.<\/p>\n

After first being detected in the Netherlands in September 2023, bluetongue has since spread across mainland Europe and Britain. The first case on the island of Ireland was found in Co Down last November.<\/p>\n

The Irish Farmers\u2019 Associaiton urged vigilance following the confirmation of the case, saying recent warm and damp weather had \u201ccreated ideal conditions for the midges that spread the disease\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe recent increase in clinically sick cattle and sheep in the UK is particularly worrying and highlights the need for farmers here to monitor their animals closely and immediately report any suspected signs to their veterinary practitioner and the Department of Agriculture,\u201d the association\u2019s animal health chair David Hall said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A case of the bluetongue virus has been found in a cattle herd in Co Wexford, the Department…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":614619,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[22828,103,61,60,9270],"class_list":["post-614618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-department-of-agriculture-food-and-the-marine","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-wexford"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=614618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/614618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/614619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=614618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=614618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=614618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}