Press Release: Byrne states Commission intention to adopt key health protection measure to reduce BSE risk

Commissioner David Byrne, responsible for Health and Consumer Protection welcomed on the 20 June 2000 the support of a majority of Member States at the Agriculture Council for a key decision strengthening consumer health protection by taking animal tissues likely to be infected with BSE out of the food and feed chain. The proposed decision can now be adopted by the European Commission in the absence of a simple majority of Member States against the proposal. The objective of the decision is to introduce harmonising rules for the removal of specified risk materials presenting a BSE risk as of October 1st. Slaughterhouses and meat cutting and processing plants in the UK and Portugal will have to take out more tissues given their higher BSE risk. In all Member States, including those countries where so far no BSE case has been detected, the tissues most likely to present a BSE risk will need to be discarded.

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