Strasbourg, 18/05/2006 (Agence Europe) - In line with a compromise accepted by most Member States and supported by the European Commission, the European Parliament, on 17 may, slightly softened the proposal extending the rules on the prevention, control and eradication of some transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSE). Adopting the report by Dagmar Roth-Behrendt (PES, Germany) on TSE (including mad-cow disease) rules on first reading (co-decision), Parliament approved changes to the proposal in order to allow, for the first time since the ban on meat- and bone-based flour in animal feeds, the possibility of authorising the use of certain proteins derived from fish in feeds for young ruminants. This authorisation will, however, be determined by the Commission in the light of scientific evaluation on the feeding needs of the ruminants. The Council could shortly confirm an agreement on this text on first reading, following the compromise reached in the Coreper on the use of fish-based flours for young ruminants. With the exception of this dispensation, the regulation retains the ban on the use of animal protein in ruminant feeds.
The proposal, presented in December 2004, allowed the 2001 rules on TSE to be adapted to the international rules to combat BSE, reducing the number of categories of risks related to BSE from 5 to 3; TSE monitoring measures to be defined; and a list of specified risk materials (SRM), which have to be removed before marketing, to be to be drawn up. Additionally, an amendment seeks to re-examine the consumption of mechanically separated meat by humans, since such meat can contain fragments of bone, potentially dangerous for human health because they can carry BSE. The EP adopted other amendments, notably to avoid as far as possible the systematic slaughter of all a whole herd where BSE is discovered.