Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (Hansard, 15 March 1990)

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make it his policy to purchase at full value all offspring of cattle affected by bovine spongiform encephalopathy; and if he will make a statement.

§ Mr. Maclean
We have no plans to do so.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what assessment he has made of the risks arising from his decision to allow the export of calves born of mothers affected by bovine spongiform encephalopathy.

§ Mr. Maclean
The Southwood working party concluded that the risk to humans from BSE is remote and there is no evidence at present to show that the disease can be transmitted maternally from dam to offspring.
From 1 March, EC measures have restricted United Kingdom cattle exports to animals less than six months old and which are not the progeny of BSE-affected dams. Exports of cattle to third countries must satisfy the health conditions imposed by those countries.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what further measures he proposes to take to prevent the spread of bovine spongiform encephalopathy among cattle and to reduce further the possibility of transmission to humans.

§ Mr. Maclean
The Government have introduced a comprehensive package of measures to tackle BSE in cattle and to eliminate the remote risk to public health.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is the relationship between scrapie and bovine spongiform encephalopathy; and if he will make a statement.

§ Mr. Maclean
BSE was almost certainly caused by feeding scrapie-infected protein material to cattle. The feeding to ruminants of protein material derived from ruminants was prohibited in July 1988.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what recent representations he has had from the National Farmers Union in respect of the incidence of bovine spongiform encephalopathy.

§ Mr. Maclean
We have received a number of representations from the National Farmers Union about BSE.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what steps his Ministry will take to ensure that no threat is posed to humans by the sale of calves of six months or under, whose mothers are affected by bovine spongiform encephalopathy.

§ Mr. Maclean
If transmission from dam to offspring can take place (and there is no evidence to indicate that this occurs), research into scrapie suggests that the agent of the disease would not be detectable in such young animals.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what studies have been undertaken to establish whether bovine spongiform encephalopathy can transfer from cattle to sheep; and if he will make a statement.
327W

§ Mr. Maclean
Studies on the experimental transmission of BSE from cattle to sheep are being undertaken as part of the Ministry's programme of research announced on 9 January at column572.