§ Baroness Byfordasked Her Majesty's Government:
Further to the Written Answer by the Lord Whitty on 6 May (WA 136), what criteria have been used to evaluate the "successful measures taken by the French, Belgian and German Governments to reduce the incidence of rabies in wild foxes"; and over what period the evaluation has been carried out. [HL2838]
§ Lord WhittyTheRabies Bulletin Europe, produced by the World Health Organisation, is published every quarter and reports on the number of rabies cases in Europe.
When the Channel Tunnel was built in 1993, there were 261 rabies cases in France, two in Belgium and 845 in Germany. Over the years mainland Europe has eradicated rabies by widespread oral vaccination programmes. In 2003 France and Belgium had no cases of rabies and Germany had 24. The nearest occurence of wildlife rabies (during the last quarter of 2003) to the Channel Tunnel was in the Hessen region of Germany.