Robin said: >Much as I hesitate to contribute to this, it strikes me as unnecessary >pedantry. Perhaps, but not really ostentatious. It is more a concern for accuracy in the reporting of a very serious subject. >Yes, "hoof and mouth" is more accurate - except I understand from >the definition that horses aren't affected - so now I suppose we'll have to >call it "cloven hoof and ruminant's mouth disease" to avoid any confusion, >in case some mothers worry that while their kids don't have hooves, they do >have mouths. A cloven hoof and ruminant's mouth is redundant. A hoof is cloven AND a ruminate has hooves by definition. However, I think that mothers who have kids with infections in their mouths and on their feet are frightened by the term "Foot and Mouth" disease, as I am somewhat certain sure your mother would be -- but I'm not positive considering your sensitivity to mothers. :-) >It strikes me as unnecessary because most diseases are specific to their own >group of animals, and it only has to describe the disease in that context. >Foot and mouth describes the disease in its target victims. Sure, their feet >are hooves - but in the victims, that *is* their feet. LOL -- nooooo that's the point. They don't have feet. They have hoofs, or cloven feet, but not feet. I know that horses have shoes, but that doesn't mean that they have feet. Not that it matters much and I don't know if you hunt, but when was the last time you tracked an animal? Did it have feet or hooves and why did you make the distinction? >While you can validly campaign for using a more specific terminology, you >can't call the original terminology "wrong". It is a disease affecting the >feet and mouths of ruminants, no? No, it does NOT affect their feet -- they don't have any -- it affect their hooves. So, while I can campaign for more accurate terminology, the existence of prior terminology to the contrary does not prove them right. The world was (with the exception of the Egyptians) first reported as flat, wasn't it? But, I think we all can agree that the world is an oblate spheroid, can we not? tedd -- http://sperling.com/