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Europe slated for BSE reaction
BRUSSELS, Belgium -- Governments in the European Union have been criticised for acting too slowly to curb the spread of mad cow disease. The EU's Health Commissioner David Byrne also said he wanted monthly reports from the governments on what they were doing to contain the disease bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). Britain and Portugal, which have had larger outbreaks of mad cow disease than most other EU nations, already have to present monthly reports on their safety measures. "It is surely a matter of very great regret that this determination to tackle BSE has taken so long to emerge," Byrne told the European Parliament on Thursday. He urged countries to follow the lead of Britain, where confidence in beef has improved despite Britain having more cases of BSE than any other EU member. Public faith in beef in Germany has plunged by 50 percent since the first cases of the disease in Germany were found in November, while beef consumption is down by 40 percent in Spain and Italy, and 25 percent in France. "The level of consumer confidence in the UK is high. The consumption of beef in the UK is now higher than it was in 1996," Byrne said. "I believe it is because consumers realise the scientific advice has been correct, the lawmakers have responded to that correctly and put safety measures in place." Byrne said it was the stringent measures that have allowed Britain's beef market to recover. "Consumers can conclude that they believe somebody is in charge, they're doing something about it, they appear to know what they are doing because the BSE incidence is falling and therefore they consume beef," he said. Germany will slaughter about 400,000 older cattle to help farmers and combat BSE as part of the Europe-wide cull. The mass slaughter will cost 647 million marks ($311 million), the agriculture ministry said, with the EU contributing just under half the cost. Germany would usually kill about four million cattle a year, but consumers' fear of infected beef has slashed, leaving many farms with unwanted cows over 30 months old -- the age group most suspected of carrying the disease and targeted in the slaughter. Ireland and France are also killing thousands of animals under the programme. Scientists link the cattle disease with the human version of a fatal brain-wasting ailment, variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. It has killed more than 80 people in Europe since the mid-1990s, mostly in Britain. Nationwide testing for BSE on German cattle will be co-ordinated by a research institute on Riems, a tiny island off the Baltic Sea coast of former Communist east Germany. Thomas Mettenleiter, head of the Federal Research Centre for Animal Virus Illnesses (BFAV), said it will also receive $96 million to launch a major BSE research programme. "Ultimately, we could envisage understanding how to treat it," Mettenleiter said of the disease, so far incurable in both its cattle and human form. The Associated Press & Reuters contributed to this report. RELATED STORIES:
Germany to cull 400,000 cattle RELATED SITES:
European Union: Public Health |
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