Not long ago, the editorial team of FBRK analysed in detail the situation with mass livestock slaughter in Russian regions and posed the question: is the officially named pasteurellosis a cover for a far more dangerous diagnosis — foot-and-mouth disease. At that time, the threat appeared external — something happening across the border. Today, it is already inside the country.
"IT WAS DROOLING": VIDEO FROM WKO
Very recently, video recordings began appearing on social media, filmed in the West Kazakhstan Region (WKO), in the Kaztalovsky district, near the village of Karaoba. The footage shows a saiga antelope. It is moving, but strangely: slowly, disoriented. The animal has a damaged mouth and is dribbling saliva profusely. Whatever this is, it is not the behaviour of healthy steppe antelopes.
Doctor of Veterinary Sciences, Chairman of the public association "Veterinary Doctors of WKO", Gaisa Absatirov, commented on what is currently happening in Kazakhstan on his Facebook page. According to him, recent cases of clinical signs characteristic of foot-and-mouth disease are being recorded precisely in the habitat and migration zones of saiga antelopes in the WKO territory.
The specialist particularly emphasised the mobility of these animals: in a single day, a saiga can cover vast distances, turning it into an unpredictable live vector for the spread of infection in several directions at once — both within Kazakh territory and beyond its borders.
WHERE THE THREAT MAY COME FROM
To understand why the situation with saiga in WKO is not a local episode but a link in a dangerous chain, one must look at the map. In April 2026, Kazakhstan found itself in a ring of epizootic pressure from several sides at once.
The first front — Russia. As FBRK detailed reported earlier, since February 2026, authorities in the Novosibirsk, Omsk, Sverdlovsk regions, the Altai Republic and a number of other regions have begun mass destruction of livestock. The official version is pasteurellosis and rabies.
However, the scale of the measures, their nature — the destruction of all susceptible animals within a radius of up to 5 km from the outbreak, burning of carcasses, quarantine cordons with checkpoints, refusal to allow owners independent expert examination — exactly reproduces the protocol for combating foot-and-mouth disease, not a bacterial infection that is treatable with antibiotics.
According to estimates, approximately 90,000 head of livestock were seized in Russian regions. Kazakhstan promptly imposed a ban on the import and transit of animals and products from these regions, which was a proportionate measure, but not a solution to the problem.
The second front — China. In early April 2026, China's Ministry of Agriculture reported an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Gansu Province and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region — territory directly bordering Kazakhstan. The disease was confirmed in 219 animals from two herds.
Chinese authorities particularly noted that the identified strain proved to be highly contagious and resistant to the vaccines used in China, and its appearance is presumably linked to importation from abroad. Thus, from the east, the country is pressed by a confirmed, officially recognised outbreak — unlike the Russian one, where the diagnosis has still not been officially announced.
The third front — inside the country. If the first two fronts were external, and one could at least theoretically close the border against them, the third front knows no borders in principle. And its name is the saiga antelope.
WHY THE SAIGA IS A SEPARATE AND SPECIAL PROBLEM
The saiga is a unique animal from an epizootiological point of view. It is susceptible to foot-and-mouth disease, migrates hundreds of kilometres, crosses several regions within a few days, and recognises neither quarantine zones nor border posts. This is precisely why Dr Absatirov singled out this vector as "very dangerous from an epizootic perspective".
If the saiga in WKO, recorded in the videos from the Kaztalovsky district, are indeed affected by foot-and-mouth disease (and the symptoms described and visually demonstrated in the video are characteristic of this disease: damage to the oral mucosa, profuse salivation, lack of coordination), then the infection has already escaped the confines of a "manageable" space.
According to data on foot-and-mouth disease outbreaks in Kazakhstan from 1955 to 2013, April is one of the most epizootically vulnerable months: it is precisely in the period from February to April that local strains traditionally become active, as our editorial team has repeatedly stated. Kazakhstan is experiencing this period now, under pressure from two external directions simultaneously and with an internal outbreak among wild animals.
WHAT THE AUTHORITIES ARE DOING
It is worth noting that the committee for veterinary control and supervision of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Republic of Kazakhstan acted professionally at the border. Attempts to transit livestock with clinical signs of infectious disease through the country's territory were promptly suppressed by veterinary specialists at the border and in transport. The imposition of a ban on the import and transit of animals, products, feed and biological materials from problem regions was a timely and justified decision.
But the saiga does not pass through a border checkpoint. It does not present a veterinary certificate. It simply goes — wherever its instincts and seasonal migration lead it. And if in its habitat zones and migration routes there are neither sufficient veterinary specialists, nor systematic monitoring of wild animals, nor prompt vaccination prophylaxis for livestock in neighbouring farms — then the border with Russia and China loses a significant part of its protective purpose.
Let us note that the FBRK editorial team aims neither to inflame the situation nor to draw premature conclusions. However, even with the most restrained approach, the emerging picture looks very alarming. The combination of factors indicates a risk that Kazakhstan may long remain in the status of a country affected by foot-and-mouth disease. And this is no longer about hypotheses regarding an unknown illness; it is about closed export markets, stagnation of the industry and an actual braking of the development of the entire livestock potential.
Against this backdrop, questions inevitably arise regarding the effectiveness of the current veterinary safety system, as well as decisions concerning the so-called regulation of the saiga population. The measures being taken, including culling, have so far not demonstrated sustainable control over the epizootic situation and, on the contrary, highlight vulnerabilities that, in the current conditions, have become fundamentally important.
Dr Absatirov urged the committee's leadership to organise a visit of specialists to the sites to conduct an epizootiological survey and participate actively in anti-epizootic measures and vaccination prophylaxis in organised farms and private subsidiary plots (PSPs).
The FBRK editorial team has sent official inquiries to the relevant departments to ascertain whether cases of foot-and-mouth disease in wild animals have been officially recorded.