On the island of Sardinia, a major sheep farming region in Italy, Michela Dessi, a shepherd, has witnessed the deaths of 150 adult sheep and 140 lambs over the past few months due to a viral disease transmitted by insects known as Bluetongue, which is devastating the local livestock.
Sardinia, the second-largest island in the Mediterranean, is home to approximately three million sheep, nearly double the island’s human population, and accounts for 40% of Italy’s sheep population.
A sheep suffering from Bluetongue in Sardinia. (Photo: Reuters).
This industry employs over 27,000 people and is an integral part of the island’s cultural identity, thanks to products such as salty cheese “pecorino” made from sheep’s milk.
The sheep farming sector in Sardinia is under threat from the infectious Bluetongue virus, which has affected about a quarter of the 13,000 sheep farms this year, killing 40,000 sheep compared to only 5,000 in 2023.
The transmission source for this virus is a small insect, Culicoides, measuring 1-3 mm in length, which has been thriving not only in summer but also into autumn as the Mediterranean basin becomes warmer.
“The sheep start to fall ill, limping, having fevers and dying after a few hours or days, sometimes suffocating on their own saliva,” Dessi, who has managed her family farm with 600 sheep in the southern part of the island since 2007, stated.
Other symptoms of this disease, which also affects cattle but is less dangerous, include mouth ulcers, discharge from the mouth and nose, and a blue discoloration of the tongue, hence the name Bluetongue.
Outbreaks of Bluetongue have occurred in several regions across Europe in recent months, primarily due to global warming creating favorable conditions for the disease-carrying insect, but with less severe damage than that seen in Sardinia.
Bluetongue does not affect humans or the safety of animal meat or milk.
“Sardinia has been particularly severely affected, with an exponential spread that we have never seen before. The emergency is not over yet,” said Luca Saba, the local head of the Coldiretti agricultural lobby group in Italy.
The regional agriculture director of Sardinia, Gianfranco Satta, mentioned that the regional government has allocated 13.5 million euros (14.7 million dollars) to compensate affected farmers, but Coldiretti estimates the damages could reach 25 million USD.
The disease was first identified in the 18th century in South Africa and appeared in Italy in 2000.
