Aussies travelling back from Bali are being urged to leave their shoes behind (!!) before boarding their planes back to Australia due to the risk of foot and mouth disease. Looks like it’s free feet for all!!!
Foot-and-mouth disease causes blisters and sores on cloven-hooved animals (like cows, goats, pigs, sheep) and is extremely contagious between infected individuals but you don’t need to worry about catching it — it rarely ever infects humans and if it does (through drinking infected milk, for example) it doesn’t cause serious illness.
What you do need to worry about — if you’ve been travelling — is bringing the disease back with you unwittingly through muddy or poopy shoes from infected farms.
The virus has been found in several Asian countries and Indonesia has been the latest to be hit — specifically with an outbreak in Bali.
It seems that everyone I’ve interacted with for more than 17 seconds is holidaying in Bali right now, so authorities are urging Aussies travelling back into the country to clean their shoes thoroughly before arriving — or just leave them behind all together. Barefoot is legal, etc.
“The risk of the virus coming into Australia is extremely low, but it’s not zero,” Agriculture Minister Murray Watt told Sunrise on Thursday.
Foot and mouth fragments have been detected in a number of meat products imported from Asia. pic.twitter.com/mkqKiAoRFE
— Sunrise (@sunriseon7) July 20, 2022
“What travellers need to do, if they’ve been in Bali [or any other affected countries], if they’ve been near livestock or on a farm: clean your shoes very thoroughly, clean your clothing very thoroughly, and frankly if you don’t need to bring your shoes back then leave them behind.”
Uhhh, and have freaks take pictures of my incredibly high-value tootsies like that one woman?
But it’s the official advice so get on it people — or else say goodbye to your beloved charcuterie boards.
If the live virus does make it into the country and infect Aussie livestock (so far we’ve only found dead fragments in imported meats), it’ll have devastating effects on the live stock industry. It’s estimated it could decimate the cattle industry and cause $80 billion worth of damage. Yikes.
So basically, wash your damn shoes or enjoy shitting yourselves on $75 cheese!
Incredibly grateful to be plant-based right now, tbh.
