Farmers' 'private kills' could bring infection into human food chain

Sir John Krebs, the head of the Food Standards Agency, yesterday warned that a loophole in the law may be allowing BSE-infected meat to enter the human food chain.

Sir John Krebs, the head of the Food Standards Agency, yesterday warned that a loophole in the law may be allowing BSE-infected meat to enter the human food chain.

Farmers who slaughter cattle privately for their own consumption do not have to abide by the strict regulations designed to protect humans against bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).

Sir John said there is anecdotal evidence of some farmers selling this meat to the public using a black market, which could be a source of BSE-contaminated beef. Farm guests - paid or otherwise - could also have been fed such beef.

Cattle more than 30 months old are not permitted to be slaughtered by licensed abattoirs, but this restriction does not apply to cattle killed by an unlicensed slaughterhouse for a farmer's private consumption, Sir John told Radio 4's Farming Today programme.

He added: "The requirement to remove the specified risk material, which is the area of the body which may contain infectivity - that requirement wouldn't necessarily be applied in the case of a private kill.

"That is precisely why we are concerned about both the extent to which this goes on and the possibility that meat or meat products from private kills might get into the wider food chain.

"This issue is one that was raised to us in our review of the BSE controls and we may or may not be able to resolve it in the short term, but we do want to raise consumer awareness of it and make sure that in the longer term work is done to tighten up this loophole."

Professor Peter Smith, who is acting chairman of the Government's Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee (Seac), said he was also unhappy with the legal loophole being used by farmers.

"I'd be concerned about cattle over 30 months of age being consumed by anyone. If we're trying to protect public health, there's no reason why farmers should be any different to the rest of the public," he said.

Sir John said farmers in Britain have been allowed to slaughter and consume their own livestock, but the law is not clear on whether they are allowed to serve it to their families or other house guests.

Peter Scott, the director of the British Meat Federation, which represents licensed abattoirs, said there is strong circumstantial evidence to suggest that meat from unlicensed abattoirs is being made available to the wider public.

"I would strongly suspect that the animals in them that are brought in by farmers for private kills are returned to the farmers in quantities that would be difficult to consume in one family over a reasonable period of time," he said.

Unlicensed abattoirs are not inspected on a regular basis by the Meat Hygiene Service. Mr Scott said he wanted all meat destined for human consumption to be slaughtered in licensed premises, where animals can be adequately inspected and all specified offal removed in accordance with BSE controls.