[Foot-and-mouth disease of cattle is not a zoonosis].

In 1997 there was an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) among cattle in Turkey. People visiting that country were warned against importing animal products into the Netherlands. This had nothing to do with hazards to human health, as FMD virus is not a zoonotic virus, but with the risk of spread of the disease to livestock in the Netherlands, notably to cattle and pigs. A disease with similar clinical symptoms in pigs is swine vesicular disease (SVD), which is not a zoonosis either. FMD virus is an aphtovirus, SVD virus is an enterovirus. Hand-foot-and-mouth disease in humans is caused by other enteroviruses, i.e. Coxsackie virus and enterovirus 71.