Meat: Inspections

(asked on 22nd June 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many instances of animals with (a) oedema, (b) emaciation and (c) bruising and trauma were identified at official post-mortem inspection and prevented from entering the food chain by officials working for and on behalf of the Food Standards Agency performing meat inspections on red meat animals from 1 January 2014 to 31 March 2020.


Answered by
Jo Churchill Portrait
Jo Churchill
Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 7th July 2020

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) holds the following data. For the period 1 January 2014 – 31 March 2020 the following instances were identified at post-mortem and prevented from entering the food chain:

Condition

Number of Instances

*Oedema

*470,701

*Emaciation

Bruising and trauma

454,600

In 2015/16 the FSA, through consultation, with the Association of Meat Inspectors, meat hygiene inspectors, industry representatives, other Government departments, devolved administrations, academic organisations, internal and external veterinarians and others developed a more defined and actionable list of conditions surrounding animal health, public health and animal welfare.

Note:

*The conditions Oedema and Emaciation are not recorded separately and are combined in the Food Standards Agency Collection and Communication of Inspection Results IT system. The 470,701 number of instances represents the cumulative number of emaciation and oedema cases identified at post-mortem inspection.

Reticulating Splines