§ Mr. DrewTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what estimate he has made of how many more animals will be included in the cull as a result of the addition of maternal transmissions. [64646]
§ Mr. RookerThe selective cull, which removes cattle which have been exposed to BSE through contaminated feed, has been operating since January 1997. Since maternal transmission was confirmed as a possibility, a further cull has been initiated to slaughter offspring born after 1 August 1996 to confirmed BSE cases. This has operated on a voluntary basis since August 1998 and became compulsory on 4 January 1999. It has been estimated that, at most, 10,000 animals might need to be slaughtered under the arrangements. Inevitably, this estimate rests on assumptions about the future course of 127W the epidemic and the number of offspring found to be already dead. The final number may well be considerably less.
Before beef exports can resume under the Date Based Export Scheme, the UK must slaughter all living offspring born between 1 August 1996 and the date of the EC Decision on the DBES (25 November 1998) to confirmed BSE cases. This is likely to be at least 3,500 animals.