What is the incidence of BSE?

In order to make international comparisons, data from the Office International Des Epizooties (IOE) were used. At the time of updating this article, data was only available up to September 2001 for the UK and to the end of December 2001 for other countries. More recent data can be found on the sites of national authorities (see appendix).

Since November 1986 to September 2001, there have been 181,368 confirmed cases of BSE in cattle in the UK. The incidence however has shown a significant decline every year in the UK since the peak of the disease in 1992. In 1999, there were 2300 reported cases. This figure fell to 1443 in 2000 and 526 up to September 2001. (See www.oie.int for updated figures). Significantly smaller numbers of BSE cases have been reported in Austria (1), Belgium (68), Czech Republic (2), Denmark (8), Finland (1), France (499), Germany (148), Greece (1), Ireland (833), Italy (54), Japan (3), Liechtenstein (2), Luxembourg (1), the Netherlands (28), Portugal (628), Slovakia (5), Slovenia (1), Spain (88) and Switzerland (403). ( See www.oie.int or national authority websites for updated figures)

The Scientific Steering Committee of the EU has developed a series of reports on the likelihood of BSE occurring in cattle in various countries (See Appendix). The assessment is based on considerations such as whether or not live cattle or meat-and-bone meal were imported from high-risk countries (especially the UK) and the presence of risk management strategies in the country. The Committee concluded that it is highly unlikely that BSE will occur in cattle from Argentina, Australia, Botswana, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Namibia, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Paraguay, Singapore, Swaziland and Uruguay as they have not imported live cattle from BSE-affected countries or BSE-infected meat and bone meal and no cases of BSE have been detected in these countries.

Although other countries - Canada, Sweden and the United States of America - have imported cattle and meat and bone meal from Europe in the past, no BSE has been detected in livestock in these countries. The EU Scientific Steering Committee has stated that BSE is unlikely to be present in cattle in these countries although "the possibility cannot be totally excluded".