A United Kingdom equine influenza (EI) expert in Australia to monitor the horse flu control program has praised the NSW response to the outbreak.

UK Animal Health Trust veterinarian, Dr Richard Newton, led the UK response to three outbreaks of new strains of the EI virus in 1995, 1998 and 2003 at Newmarket - the home of UK racing.

Dr Newton was recently briefed by NSW response leaders and shared UK horse flu intelligence with NSW and Queensland veterinarians.

"From what I’ve seen, I think there is a good chance of eradication in Australia," Dr Newton said.

"You have to be encouraged by the progress here to date.

"The situation in Australia now is totally different to the first UK outbreak in 1965, when we didn’t have any experience."

Dr Newton was impressed with the speed of Australia’s EI response once the virus was detected.

"The early movement ban was absolutely critical and effective," he said.

"Australia’s response is unique because you’ve got a large, naive population of horses meaning it would have spread like wildfire" if it wasn’t for the standstill.

Knowledge about the Australian EI response would prove useful in managing the virus in the UK, according to Dr Newton.

"It’s been very interesting to hear how natural barriers, vaccination and buffers have been used to contain and eradicate the virus in Australia," he said.

"Vaccination is a very important tool in all this."

Unlike Australia, the UK allowed its first EI outbreak to spread and take hold in 1965. Dr Newton said it was decided to let the 1965 outbreak run its course because the expertise to contain and eradicate the virus did not exist.

"It’s too late for the government and industry in the UK to eradicate the disease now, so we have had to learn to live with it," he said.

One consequence of allowing EI to run rampant across the UK was the now mandatory regular vaccination of race horses, at considerable cost to horse owners.

Rampant EI also forced the UK racing industry to be constantly on guard for new evolving new strains of the virus that can render current vaccines useless, requiring new vaccines to be regularly developed.

Dr Newton noted that Australia’s EI containment and eradication experience would be useful for other countries and locally in a foot and mouth outbreak.

"There seems to be a lot of lessons for others from this - and EI seems to be more infectious than foot and mouth," he said.