Thanks to everyone who commented on my 7 February blog on sampling for horsemeat in beef.
If you go to the FSA website you will find tables containing results from the latest round of tests.
In response to the blog, Andy and Jim both touch on the issue of safety and ask why the FSA can say that meat is safe or, indeed, ‘guarantee’ that it is safe.
We would never guarantee that any foodstuff is 100% safe. However, we have stressed that, on the basis of the evidence we have, there is no food safety risk to consumers from the beef products found to contain horse meat. There is nothing about horse meat that makes it any more or less safe than other meat products. However, whenever horsemeat has been found we have insisted on it being tested for the presence of phenylbutazone (or ‘bute’), a commonly used medicine in horses that is not allowed in the food chain.
Bute was banned from most medical uses in humans after it was found that about 1 person in 30,000 recipients suffered a serious side effect. But in levels reported in previous FSA testing of contaminated meat, the maximum level found would have to be multiplied a thousand-fold to be at the same level as that which used to be given to humans. None of the meat products that have tested positive for horse DNA have tested positive for bute.
This suggests that even if you have eaten products that contain contaminated horse meat, the risk of damage to your health is very low.
We have therefore been advising consumers that on the basis of the evidence we have there is no food safety risk with these products.
But we do agree this is unacceptable and does raise uncertainties about the security of the food chain. This is why we are carrying out urgent investigations, some of which involve the police. I am currently unable to comment on because they may lead to prosecutions.
Martyn asks if we are testing mince. The answer is yes. The FSA has ordered food businesses to conduct authenticity tests (in other words, find out the content accurately and match what the label says) on all beef products, such as beef burgers, meatballs and lasagne, and provide the results to the FSA. Tinned beef products, such as mince, are also included in the local authority enforcement survey.
Yannis asks if the FSA can let people have the results of audits of meat processing plants and abattoirs, and what happens if parts of the law are broken.
The FSA strives always to be open and transparent in the work that it does and, as part of this, we regularly published data on our auditing of abattoirs and meat plants.You can find these on our website in the sections foraudit, and for all approved premises. Enforcement actions are initiated when a food business operator is failing to comply with the relevant legislation, and particularly where there are risks to public health, animal health or animal welfare safeguards.
Similar to other enforcement agencies, the FSA applies a hierarchy of enforcement actions ranging from informal to formal action, to stopping of production, serving of notices and referrals for prosecution.
Page 22 of the FSA Operations Annual Report for 2011/12 provides some details of our enforcement activity in FSA approved meat establishments from April 2011 to end of March 2012.