Under no circumstances should any meat or other animal products be brought into the United States - no matter how small or apparently safe. No clothing or footwear that was worn in the country experiencing HMD should be worn unless properly disinfected. The morbidity rate in outbreaks of HMD in susceptible animals can rapidly approach 100 percent, although the case fatality rate is generally less than 2 percent but slightly higher in younger animals. The severity varies widely between the different viral strains. More severe reactions can include heart failure, enteritis, and ascending posterior paralysis.
Vaccination is common in the countries where the disease occurs.
Clinical disease is reduced by vaccination, but carrier animals still occur and can, in fact, be produced by the vaccine. These carrier animals are a potent method of spreading the disease and also provide an excellent medium for the mutation of existing viral strains.