As the foot and mouth crisis deepens and the British government considers vaccination to help contain the disease, the biggest Protestant organization in The Netherlands has declared that vaccination is at least an option.

The Uniting Protestant Churches in The Netherlands (Samen op Weg-kerken), has given tacit backing to the Dutch government decision to adopt vaccination. The European Union, of which The Netherlands is a member, reluctantly gave permission on March 26 for limited vaccinations here. They began the same day.

The Netherlands is one of a handful of European countries to be affected by the foot and mouth crisis. Both in the United Kingdom and in continental Europe, vaccination is a divisive issue. Foot and mouth has seven different strains with many sub-groups, and to be effective the correct vaccine is required for each strain. Also, countries which use vaccination lose their disease-free status on international markets. Volkskrant, a daily newspaper, pointed out that vaccination could in fact be a source of infection—of the 34 outbreaks of foot and mouth in Europe between 1977 and 1987, 13 were due to causes such as viruses escaping from laboratories making vaccines.

In 1991 for economic reasons the EU banned vaccinations against foot-and-mouth. This decision brought an extra 40 million guilders (US$16.1 million) in annual income to Dutch farmers through exports to the United States, Japan and Korea, according to Volkskrant. These countries buy only meat from non-vaccinated animals. Vaccination is estimated to cost 24 million guilders (US$9.7 million) a year.

When foot and mouth was confirmed in England early in February, The Netherlands imposed some of the strictest restrictions and animal slaughter policies in Europe. The Netherlands is particularly vulnerable to infection because animal farming is very intensive. Farm animals and poultry here total 122 million cattle, pigs, sheep and chickens.

The Uniting Protestant Churches said in a public statement on March 21 that the EU decision to end vaccination against foot-and-mouth disease a decade ago was due to economic pressures that were "too one-sided."

"The current crisis is an outgrowth of the policy decisions taken by the EU in 1991, "church spokesperson Klaas van der Kamp told ENI. "With these sorts of excesses, of which farmers here are very critical, we have reached the end of this process."

Van der Kamp said that Dutch farmers were strongly protesting against the mass slaughter of animals.

A group of Uniting Protestant clergy in the eastern part of The Netherlands—the area currently worst affected—had signed a public statement calling for vaccination, he said.

Article continues below

According to the statement, the Uniting Protestant Churches are providing pastoral support to Dutch farmers, but, the statement added, there were no simple solutions to the crisis. "Experience of a catastrophe like this reveals how powerless humans are in the 21st century, despite the economic and material progress of the past."

The statement added that international trade was transforming local problems into much larger disasters.

Jaantje Vink, coordinator of the ecumenical Network on Churches and Agriculture (Netwerk Kerken en Landbouw), also expressed support for vaccination. They were urgently needed and both ethically and economically acceptable, she told ENI. However, there was uncertainty as to whether an effective vaccine would be ready in time. "Vaccination will have no relevance for this epidemic," she predicted. "We will have to wait until the next outbreak of foot and mouth."

Vink stressed the need for a quick solution to the mounting crisis. She pointed out that over 40 percent of farmers in The Netherlands already qualified for social welfare support. "Many will have to give up farming. There is no future for them," she said.

Farmers whose animals were suffering from the disease urgently needed pastoral support, Vink said. She also called for reflection on the development of an agricultural system that was fair to the environment and animals and also provided adequate income for farmers.

The Network on Churches and Agriculture, in which the Uniting Protestant Churches and the Roman Catholic Church are represented, was set up in 1997 when The Netherlands was in the grip of swine fever.

Opposition to the mass culling of animals is growing throughout The Netherlands, according to media reports. With the mass destruction of healthy animals and animals stricken by an infection from which most would recover, "Western Europe has crossed the boundary of civilized behavior," a leading, national daily newspaper, Trouw, declared on March 22. The newspaper urged European governments to take up vaccination.

"Hopefully [Europe] will not wait until we are a few million carcasses down the track."

A Dutch Reformed clergyman T. de Jong, from Staphorst, a village renowned for its conservative Christianity, has caused controversy by describing the outbreak of foot-and-mouth as a judgment of God on The Netherlands. "We do not want to see God's hand or recognize God's action," De Jong wrote in a conservative Reformed publication, Het Gekrookte Riet (The Crooked Reed), of which he is executive editor.

Article continues below

Related Elsewhere


Two weeks ago, Christianity Today took note of The Netherlands' legalization of euthanasia and the claim by the local head of the Roman Catholic Church that the government was ignoring religion.

Christianity Today has also covered the foot-and-mouth outbreak in the U.K.

As noted in yesterday's Weblog, recent stories about churches and foot and mouth include:

Churches are forced to cancel services | Special arrangements being planned for Palm Sunday and Easter. (The Daily Telegraph, London)

Churches called on to resurrect plague hymn | "All Creation Groans and Travails" was written by famous hymnwriter John Mason Neale during the Great Cattle Plague of 1866. (The Daily Telegraph, London)

Church bells will ring out to show their support for farmers | Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey has published three prayers for foot-and-month-oriented services. (The Daily Telegraph, London)