UN declares second disease eradicated after global vaccination campaign

The United Nations has declared that a long-term, global vaccination campaign has completely eradicated a disease that has killed millions of bovines for millennia. It is the first animal disease to be officially declared eradicated – and only the second disease ever, after smallpox. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has officially stated that the world was free of rinderpest, or cattle plague, but also “called on the world community to follow up by ensuring that samples of rinderpest viruses and vaccines be kept under safe laboratory conditions and that rigorous standards for disease surveillance and reporting be applied.” The announcement followed verification last month by the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) that the disease was no longer circulating in its natural habitat. The last outbreak of rinderpest was registered in wild buffalo in Kenya in 2001, and the last vaccination took place in 2006. “The declaration is the final step...