Foot and mouth is one of the most contagious and economically damaging farmyard plagues. Sheep, cows, pigs, goats and deer – anything with a cloven hoof – can catch the virus. Animals normally survive but they are often weakened for life. The disease was first identified in the 1540s by a scholar from Verona, named Girolamo Fracastoro, who also gave the first full medical description of syphilis, in a poem that was 1,300 verses long.
