APPENDIX 3: TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES
(NO. 2) (AMENDMENT) REGULATIONS 2008 (SI 2008/1180)
Further information from the Food Standards Agency
1. This note provides further information following
a request from the Committee in relation to paragraph 7.2.1 of
the Explanatory Memorandum to the Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies
(No.2) (Amendment) Regulations 2008.
2. Until May 2006, bovine vertebral column (VC)
was classified as Specified Risk Material (SRM) in UK cattle aged
over 30 months. This age limit was reduced to 24 months in May
2006 because of the need to harmonise controls with the rest of
the EU in order get the export ban lifted. At the time the UK
argued strongly for a 30 month age limit to be applied throughout
the EU. The Government's Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory
Committee (SEAC)'s statement on BSE exposure risk from vertebral
column made on 21 April 2005 was used to support the argument.
SEAC concluded at the time that the difference in risk classifying
VC as SRM at 30 months as opposed to 12 months (the age limit
applicable in other Member States at the time) was very small
verging on negligible. Unfortunately the 30 month proposal did
not attract enough support from other Member States at the time.
Since then the incidence of BSE has continued to decline. Furthermore,
in April 2007, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) Biohazard
Panel concluded that on the basis of current scientific knowledge,
likely detectable infectivity in the central nervous system of
cattle appears to be about three quarters of the incubation period
and that it can be predicted that the infectivity would be sub-detectable
or still absent in cattle aged 33 months. This provided evidence
to support a change in the age at which bovine vertebral column
is classified as SRM, the European Commission, Council and Parliament
considered the proposal, following their considerations, the Commission
adopted and published the proposal. The Community Regulation was
amended and amending Regulation came into force on 26 April 2008.
3. The overall BSE risk in the UK has continued
to fall since 1999 and prevalence of BSE in cattle entering the
food supply is now estimated to be very low. The ban on UK beef
bones for food manufacturing was retained mainly because of a
concern about a possible risk from bone marrow following consideration
by the Government's Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee
of a single finding of infectivity in 1998. However, further testing
carried out since then, using a more sensitive method, has found
no further evidence of infectivity in bone marrow. Nevertheless,
if infectivity does occasionally occur in beef bones, the risk
will be extremely low and, with the other measures in place, the
ban on UK bones in manufacturing will have little or no effect
in reducing any risk, especially when imported bones of similar
risk may be substituted.
May 2008
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