The Disease Foot and Mouth Disease is a highly contagious viral disease affecting practically all cloven-footed mammals, including cattle, sheep, goats, and swine. The horse is resistant to the infection. The virus is spread by both inhalation and ingestion.
Blisters appear on the foot, causing lameness.
For animals that survive the disease, great losses in weight occur because the animals cannot eat. The flow of milk is sharply diminished in surviving milk-producing animals. The virus can survive for relatively long periods of time in the air, in food and garbage, and even in hides, hair, and wool, so measures for controlling the disease are necessarily rigorous. A diagnosis of the affected animals must be made quickly and the area quarantined, after which all infected or susceptible animals are slaughtered and their carcasses burned. There is no effective treatment for infected animals.