The current UK vaccine, Nobivac Myxo-RHD , offers protection against RVHD-1 and
Myxomatosis, but is unlikely to offer any protection against RVHD-2, as this strain of the virus is genetically different.
The first effective biologic control of an invasive species was
Myxomatosis virus introduced into Australian rabbits, after 40 years of dithering, in the early 1950s.
Myxomatosis is a man-made disease to control the rabbit population.
Myxomatosis was introduced in the 1950s as a control method to help control spiralling wild rabbit numbers.
And if "
Myxomatosis" wasn't enough to give you the heebie-jeebies (in a good way), Yorke sounded like he was one of the "Children of the Damned" delivering a demented schoolyard-like taunt on the eerie "The Gloaming."
(8), but this strain was later shown to cause
myxomatosis symptoms in rabbits (9,10).
Because the rabbits were causing catastrophic damage to the island's vegetation,
Myxomatosis and the European rabbit flea (which spreads the Myxoma virus) were introduced in 1968.
The veterinary charity PDSA has reported dramatic increases in the incidence of
myxomatosis in three of its PetAid hospitals.
In 1953, it was estimated there might be 100 million rabbits in the country, so the disease
myxomatosis was welcomed by landowners desperate to protect their crops.
The decline of the lynx accelerated in the 1970s when
myxomatosis and VHD wiped out the rabbit population.
This little hamlet (population 1,171 until the latest
myxomatosis victim popped her paws at the weekend) found a place on the map when Wetherby included the Tockwith Selling Hurdle on its card on Saturday.
Broad-scale control methods that require passive transport of control agents by dispersing rabbits, such as
myxomatosis and calicivirus disease, are unlikely to prove effective where rabbit populations occur in small, isolated sub-units.