Europe has been unable to eradicate foot-and-mouth disease. The different
outbreaks that occur from time to time cause enormous financial loss. In
the United States outbreaks of the disease have occurred in the following
years: 1870, 1884, 1902-'03, 1908 and 1914-'15. In the first two outbreaks
very few cattle contracted the disease, and the infection was quickly
stamped out. The third and fourth outbreaks were more extensive, and it was
necessary to slaughter several thousand cattle and hogs in order to
eradicate the disease. The first four outbreaks occurred in the eastern
States, and the disease was prevented from spreading to the principal
live-stock centers of the country, and the leading stock-raising States by
slaughtering the diseased and exposed animals and by county and State
quarantines. Early in the 1914-'15 outbreak, the disease spread to the
Chicago Stock Yards, and from there, through shipments of cattle, to the
principal live-stock sections of the country. The financial loss resulting
from this outbreak has amounted to several million dollars. The Federal and
State authorities have always been successful in stamping out the disease
in the United States.

_The specific cause_ of foot-and-mouth disease is a filterable virus that
is present in the serum from the vesicles, the saliva, milk, and various
body secretions and excretions from the sick animal. In the early stage of
the disease it is present in the blood. None of the many investigators have
been able to discover the microorganism that produces the disease.

Two of the outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease in the United States
originated from an infected vaccine used for the inoculation of vaccine
heifers. The origin of the 1914-'15 outbreak has not been discovered. When
introduced into a country, the disease spreads rapidly, through the
movement of live-stock affected by the disease. Animals recently recovered
may infect other animals. Dogs, birds, people, vehicles, milk, roughage,