Calls for meat and bonemeal ban to be lifted

Prof Wall, a former chairman of the European Food Safety Authority, said with the number of starving people in the world, it was ‘immoral’ to incinerate protein sources – such as MBM.

The risk of BSE was now greatly reduced, he said. “Can’t we start feeding ruminant meat and bonemeal to poultry?”

The BSE crisis had been the ‘switch which put the spotlight on the food chain’ he said. “It was a disaster, but it led to changes.”

It had prompted reform of European food law and led to the creation of a pan-European food safety authority.

While ‘sound and sensible’ rules and regulations were necessary, constantly divergent views from scientists were confusing, said Prof Wall, a qualified medical doctor and vet.

“It doesn’t take much to confuse a politician,” he said.

But often, political and policy response to food safety issues were in response to media interest and not in proportion to the risk to public health, he said.

He cited the example of the global recall of all Irish pork products in 2008 after minute traces of poly-chlorinated biphenyls were detected in pig carcases destined for the food chain.

Picogram levels

“Levels detected were 5,200 picograms per gram, when the EU limit is 0.75pg/gram,” he explained.

“The media went mad.”

Headlines said it contained 80 to 200 times the safe amount of the dioxins – creating public fear.

“But the limits relate to a lifetime of exposure,” said Prof Wall.

What the people did not understand was just how tiny the quantities were.

“One pictogram is one part per trillion. It is the equivalent of one second in 31,699 years.”

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