Spanish village devastated by morris dancing

Health officials race against time to save these Spanish villagers from the scourge of Britain

The World Health Organisation (WHO) issued a level 5 pandemic alert yesterday after Spanish health officials confirmed the country’s first case of morris dancing. So far the outbreak has been contained to the remote Pyrenean village of Lesaka.

Nestling high in the mountains, the community is in a state of shock, unable to understand how such a contagious disease has arrived in this quiet corner of Navarre.

The debilitating illness, which causes uncontrolled muscle spasms most commonly observed in morris dancers, is largely unknown outside the United Kingdom.

In Britain the spread of morrisella, as it is known medically, follows the distribution of real ale. It is caused by bacteria found in a single species of hops which grows only in the county of Kent. Quite how this infection found its way to Lesaka remained a mystery until now.

The village mayor, Señor Innocente Diás, said “we are doing everything we can to reassure the population and contain the spread”. Following perhaps the example of the villagers in the Eyam in Derbyshire during the Black Death, the people of Lesaka have voluntarily quarantined themselves.

No-one is allowed in or out. “We wouldn’t want our neighbours to suffer what we have experienced during the last two days” said one by telephone. “There’s not much doubt – all the symptoms are there - the uncontrolled twitching, the urge to hit one’s neighbour with a stick, the flatulence. It is most distressing to watch. Of course, the victim, himself, is completely unaware of his illness due to delirium. His delusions are such that he firmly believes that he is entertaining people.”

“Worst of all is the noise” says Señor Diás “for some reason the disease particularly attacks musicians. Our normally talented and much admired accordionists suddenly find themselves in the grip of a compulsion. It forces them to play tuneless dirges which follow no known musical form.”

Health officials attribute the outbreak to the accidental fall of barrels of Marstons Pedigree from a truck which overturned en route for the Costa del Sol, an area much frequented by older British tourists. A local farmer, mistaking the loast load for a harmless shipment of rioja, took it home to the village. "Rioja makes us laugh and fall over; I just thought it would be fun" said the farmer, Juan Alvarez. "I had no idea that it was this dangerous stuff".

“If only the lorry had been going to a resort popular with younger visitors” said Dr EmilioTonterías , a prominent Spanish bacteriologist. “They drink lager. Nothing can live in it, but Pedigree, well it is a perfect culture medium”.

In rural Navarre, where everyone drinks the local wine, villagers have no natural immunity to the morrisella bacterium. “Our people are defenceless. It has spread like a forest fire”, said DrTonterías .

“The only villagers spared were Athletico Bilbao fans who once went to a European Cup match against Manchester United.” It is believed that they may have consumed Boddingtons, a brew from the north of England. "Boddy's", as it is called locally, is a natural antidote to the disease since it provokes spontaneous vomiting on contact with Pedigree. Boddingtons' hops are grown only on the south-facing bank of the Manchester Ship Canal and are genetically-engineered to resist invasion by southern hops, especially from Kent.

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WHO and local officials hope that the symptoms will subside over the next 24 hours, now that all the missing Pedigree has been located and destroyed.