By bizn_fun 
Across the country, there are still farms operating under 1960s standards – tin shacks, walls made of baked soil or cement bricks, and no fencing.
The BBC visited one such farm on the outskirts of the city of Larissa, in Thessaly. Two dead lambs were lying on the ground.
The owner insisted that there were no cases of pox on his farm. He refused to allow photographs. “Some animals have lumps on their chest. It’s not pox, but no one will believe me,” he says.
Sheep and goat farmers in Thessaly are calling for approval of mass vaccination of their herds, which they say is how the problem is tackled in Bulgaria and Turkey.
Such vaccination is allowed in an emergency under EU rules,, external and farmers are putting a lot of pressure on the government to request vaccines from the Commission’s available stock.
However, the Greek government responds that mass vaccination could lead to Greece being classified as an endemic country for the diseases, which would bring restrictions on the export of sheep and goat’s milk – and especially of feta cheese. Greek authorities also stress that there is currently no certified vaccine against sheep pox.
Prof Gougoulis points out that the existing older vaccines are effective in countries where pox is endemic, but “are not a tool for eradication [of the disease]”. “They do not completely prevent infection, and the virus can continue to circulate within vaccinated populations.”