Fears about beef `unfounded'

The Irish Veterinary Union has called on the Minister for Health to publish advice given to him on the risk from beef on the bone "to put the fears which have been generated by this advice in a proper context". It said yesterday a great deal of unfounded fear about the safety of Irish beef had arisen and was being "fuelled by concerns about the safety of British beef which are not applicable here".

The IVU spokesman, Mr Pat Brady, said: "The potential and unnecessary damage which will be done to our food industry and those who depend on it for a living is totally disproportionate to any actual risk which may exist and which should have been spelt out very clearly."

The statement by Mr Cowen that he would continue to eat T-bone steak would be of little consolation to producers who were seeing their products removed from supermarket shelves. The IVU was working with other veterinary organisations to generate a sophisticated system of on-farm audits which would underpin high-quality safety practices and be part of a national beef assurance scheme, Mr Brady said.

"Meat-inspection procedures at both ante-mortem and post-mortem stages in Irish meat plants (domestic and export) are the best in the world. The danger is that continued fuelling of public suspicion will undermine valuable measures such as these."

The risk from consumption of meat with bone in Britain, with a much higher level of BSE than Ireland, was considered greater than one in 600 million, but with its withdrawal, people were being denied an opportunity to make decisions about the safety of beef.