Bluetongue Update No. 4 of 2026

• NDCC Bluetongue Virus Update No. 4 of 2026 (pdf 157Kb) 

• Bluetongue virus serotype-3 (BTV-3) has been confirmed in multiple cattle herds to date across a number of counties.
• Weather modelling has shown that the temperature threshold required for completion of viral replication has been reached across all of England, France and southern Wales. Therefore the risk of an incursion of an infective plume of midges into Ireland from outbreak locations there is increased.
• Research indicates that cumulative days of warm weather are required for complete viral replication in the midge vector. 50 ‘degree-days’ (a 24-hour period where the temperature is 1^oC above 12 ^o C) are required from the time the midge first becomes infected to it becoming infective to ruminant hosts that it subsequently bites.
• Increasing temperatures will speed up viral replication within the midges, which will likely result in presence of an infective midge population and an increasing environmental burden of virus, especially in warmer parts of the country.
• Vaccination can reduce viraemia and farmers who have not yet vaccinated should seriously consider vaccination as a protective tool against the clinical disease losses associated with bluetongue.
• Farmers and PVPs nationwide are encouraged to submit abortion samples to their local Regional Veterinary Laboratories as part of disease surveillance
• No restriction zones or movement controls are in place.
• There are no food safety or human health risks from Bluetongue. Milk and meat are safe to consume.

Further information on bluetongue virus is available at www.gov.ie/bluetongue

Species: Bovine, Multi-Species, Ovine