Fears that Gozo sheep reproduced and dispersed into other herds

Hundreds of sheep born from the unlicensed Gozo herd owned by Ganni Attard – whose culling for public health reasons has been ordered by a court of law – are believed to have dispersed into other herds or even been slaughtered illegally.

Highly-placed sources close to the veterinary investigation have told MaltaToday that the government authorities believe as many as 900 sheep were born since 2012, when Attard had 216 of his sheep culled by the veterinary authority.

That first culling left 300 animals in his herd, all of which are not registered with the authorities.

Since then, Attard has attempted to stop the culling and an Appeals Court recently upheld a previous ruling delivered by a magistrate, that paved the way for the remaining 300 animals to be culled. The culling was stopped when Attard secured a temporary stay of proceedings last February, until the Constitutional Court delivers its decision on his claim of an alleged breach of human rights.

After the 2012 culling, which Attard claims to have cost him €520,000, the remnant herd of 300 stayed in his Gharb farm where two police officers stationed there had to ensure that none of the animals would be removed or that their produce be sold.

The 24-hour police surveillance has so far cost taxpayers more than €600,000.

But the sources who spoke to MaltaToday believe that the herd of 300 was still reproducing.

“The last head count found 150 ewes from the 300 sheep. If there were 150 ewes in 2012, they would have had as many as 300 lambs in 2013. And that cycle would repeat itself in 2014 and 2015. So the question is, where are all the new ewes and rams? One can speculate that they have been slaughtered elsewhere or even had their produce sold, one way or another,” said the sources, who spoke to MaltaToday under condition of anonymity.

The same sources expressed doubts as to the efficacy of the Gozo police force, suggesting that police officers may not have been as alert as required to monitor any movements in and outside the farm.

Although there is no smoking gun of any wrongdoing, MaltaToday was told by the sources privy to the investigation that tools used in the slaughter of sheep – namely hooks and sickles – were found on Attard’s farm, and that dogs on the farm could have been fed the pulverised ram meat.

Attard has vehemently contested the court order because none of the sheep culled by the Veterinary Services Department in 2012 was found to be sick, according to veterinary surgeon Frank Galea, whose team analysed 152 samples from the brain stems of the culled sheep. None tested positive for Mad Cow Disease, which is the main disease they are tested for.

Originally, Magistrate Josette Demicoli had ruled that the culling was justified to safeguard public health, saying that the veterinary authorities’ actions were within the law because of an automatic suspicion that the unregistered animals were ill.

“The reason these sheep have to be culled is because none of them is registered and that means that none of their product or meat – if infected and causes sickness in humans or in other animals – will be able to be traced back to the original source of the problem,” the sources who spoke to MaltaToday said.

In the British inquiry into Mad Cow Disease, cattle were fed the remains of other cattle in the form of meat and bone meal which had not been sufficiently treated at high temperatures and still had an infectious agent from a contamination from sheep with scrapie, which had been processed in the same slaughterhouse.

During the E. coli outbreak in Germany of 2011, the country had incorrectly linked the outbreak to cucumbers imported from Spain. Only in June 2011 did Germany find that the seeds of organic fenugreek imported from Egypt were likely the source of the outbreak. In all, 3,950 people were affected and 53 died, 51 of whom were in Germany.