§ Mr. Ron DaviesTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what experiments have been undertaken to see if meat from bovines suffering from BSE is infective; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. SoamesExperiments in which mice have been inoculated with muscle tissue from cows confirmed to have BSE are in progress. Two of these have passed the end point for these studies and no clinical evidence of a scrapie or BSE-like disease has resulted. The results so far show that, as in all other naturally occurring transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, there is no detectable infectivity in muscle tissue and thus meat.
Mr. Alan W. WilliamsTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will list the number of confirmed cases of bovine spongiform encephalopathy for each year since 1986, and the latest figure for 1992 for the total number of cattle diagnosed that were(a) under two years of age, (b) aged two to three years, (c) aged three to four years, (d) aged five to six years and (e) aged seven or more years.
§ Mr. SoamesThere were 847 cases of BSE confirmed in Great Britain prior to the disease becoming notifiable on 21 June 1988. Since then the number of confirmed cases is as follows by year of report.
Number 1988 2,185 1989 7,136 1990 14,179 1991 25,013 19921 13,430 1 to 3 July. The distribution of confirmed cases of BSE as at 10 July 1992 with a date of onset of disease between January and June 1992 of known age is as follows:
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Age band (yrs) Number of cases 2 and less than 3 1 3 and less than 4 1225 4 and less than 5 3,734
Age band (yrs) Number of cases 5 and less than 6 2,132 6 and less than 7 737 7 and over 340 1 These animals will have been born during the period from 1 January 1988 to 30 June 1989.
Mr. Alan WilliamsTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he will invite the Royal Society and the Royal Colleges of Medicine to carry out a wholly independent study of the epidemiology of bovine spongiform encephalopathy.
§ Mr. SoamesNo. The spongiform encephalopathy advisory committee—the Tyrrell committee—already exists to look at all matters relating to spongiform encephalopathies.