The Department of Agriculture has issued two temporary special import licences for Salmonella and Leptospirosis vaccines previously unavailable to Irish farmers, amid low availability of vaccines for these diseases.

The licences have been issued to Carlow-based Animal Health Distributors, the veterinary medicines wing of Co-Op Animal Health, which supplies co-ops, merchants and vets.

Both vaccines will only be available to use through vets and have been authorised as prescription-only medicines.

Animal Health Distributors stated that the short period of authorisation for importing the vaccines came on the back of the requirement to “fulfil the defined need in the animal health market for critical veterinary medicines due to a failure in existing supply chains”.