HUNDREDS of rotting animal carcasses buried at two farms will not be exhumed despite contamination worries, it was announced last night.

The Environment Agency and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs have carried out risk assessments on the foot-and-mouth burial sites at West Shipley Farm, near Hamsterley, and Low West House Farm, near Tow Law, both in County Durham.

At the end of March, more than 1,000 animals were buried at each site. Concerns were raised in each case that the burial pits were too close to water supplies and included cattle over the age of five years, which could have been exposed to BSE.

At Low West House Farm, blood was found dripping from drainage pipes after it emerged a land drain had been cut on the day the animals were buried.

At West Shipley Farm, the animals were found to have been improperly buried near an underground spring.

Yesterday, The Environment Agency announced that a study had concluded that leaving the animals where they were would have minimal impact on the environment or on public health.

Gordon Kingston, regional operations director for the Newcastle Disease Emergency Control Centre, said: "We appreciate that this has been a difficult and uncertain time both for the farmers and for local communities.

"It was imperative that due care was taken in putting together this risk assessment to ensure that the decision we arrived at was the safest one possible, both in terms of avoiding environmental pollution and any potential risk to public health."

Gerard Beveridge, from Low West House Farm, said: "I am pleased that they are stopping in there after all this time."

Mr Kingston said that the North-East had not suffered a new case of foot-and-mouth since June 3, and movement restrictions had been lifted across Northumberland and Tyne and Wear. He said: "Plans are being drawn up to lift restrictions in part of County Durham, and we hope that we can start getting the North-East back to normal."

Read more about foot-and-mouth here.