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A mass screening campaign to determine whether BSE ('mad cow disease')
has spread to some of Britain's 40 million sheep should be carried out
with "great urgency", says Britain's Food Standards Agency.
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The agency said that the presence of scrapie, a similar disease,
in up to 10,000 sheep a year could be "masking" the presence
of BSE.
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BSE infected cattle have been linked to the deaths of 81 people from
new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD).
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BSE has been passed to sheep under laboratory conditions, but has
never been found to have occurred naturally, although very few tests
have been carried out.
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The
agency said sheep would have to be withdrawn totally from the market
if BSE was found in them.
The report also called for a total
ban on feeding practices that turned farm animals into cannibals.
The agency's report urged tougher tests to determine
the safety of sheep intestines used in sausage casings and to find out
whether the BSE agent could be transmitted in milk. It also called for
the use of more efficient tests to find traces of BSE in mechanically
recovered meat.
The
Telegraph November
1, 2000
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