The Thrace region of Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey has historically been a high-risk area for the introduction of FMD and other trans-boundaries diseases into Europe. By coordinating activities and taking a risk based approach to surveillance during Phase IV of the programme, greater confidence has been achieved in the FMD-free status of the region (Bulgaria and Greece are officially free of FMD and the Thrace region of Turkey is officially FMD free with vaccination) and the likelihood of early detection of an incursion is greatly increased. During Phase V, this risk-based surveillance approach will be adapted to other FAST diseases and applied in other regions and/or countries covered by component (e.g. adaptation to LSD in Balkans countries to facilitate that they regain the LSD-free status).
The work developed in Phase IV in the Balkan countries has aimed at improving the quality of contingency planning and operational procedures. In this sense, supporting the organization of simulation exercises has been one of the main activities of EuFMD in the region during the last years. In Phase V, the work to improve emergency preparedness against FAST diseases in the region will continue to be a priority using different tools: GET Prepared, adaptation of EuFMDiS to countries in the region, workshops, simulation exercises, in-country support.
EuFMD’s new work programme merged the 1.3 (Thrace) component with the 1.4 (Balkans) component of Phase IV into a renewed 1.4 component that shares the experiences between the two components to benefit the region of South Eastern Europe, actively supporting ten countries in activities as set out in EuFMD’s Phase V workplan.

The key objectives of the meeting are to:  

• share information on the surveillance activities carried out in Thrace by Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey since the last Management meeting held online last February 2021;
• agree on the upcoming activities as required.