Towards the end of April 1952, Rupert Guinness, second Earl of Iveagh, chairman of the famous brewing company and elder brother of the late Walter Guinness, former minister of agriculture, surveyed his Elveden estate. Just seven years earlier, his herd of pedigree Guernsey cows had contracted foot and mouth disease (FMD) and been slaughtered. Now their replacements had suffered the same fate. Iveagh was angry, upset and his patience was wearing thin. Why, he asked, hadn’t the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries (MAF) devised a better way of protecting Britain’s herds against FMD? Were officials not aware that in Denmark, The Netherlands and Germany livestock were now vaccinated against the disease? Surely it was time to reassess the situation, as in the current scientifically advanced age, vaccination was clearly preferable to the outdated Victorian policy of slaughter.1