Day 105 - 16 Mar 95 - Page 16


     
     1
     2   Q.   Have the standards in the abattoir industry improved as a
     3        whole in the last 10 years?
     4        A.  Is that on a measure of food safety or quality or
     5        buildings?
     6
     7   Q.   We are concerned with food safety mainly.  Yes, in terms of
     8        food safety procedures and concerns and results?
     9        A.  In my opinion, there is a very low degree of risk in
    10        abattoirs in the first case.  Therefore, to measure any
    11        improvement in terms of food poisoning outbreaks would be
    12        difficult -- almost impossible.
    13
    14   Q.   But people do get food poisoning, do they not, from meat
    15        products?
    16        A.  The incidence is so low and random that it is very
    17        difficult to measure it in any realistic term.
    18
    19   Q.   So, if there are 30,000 reported incidents of Salmonella
    20        poisoning, reported incidents, that have resulted in
    21        identification of Salmonella bacteria, you think that is
    22        low, do you?
    23        A.  Of those 30,000, between 60 and 70 per cent, depending
    24        on the figures you take, are caused by poultry, or can be
    25        traced back to poultry; 10 per cent are contracted abroad;
    26        10 per cent arise from human carriers at the catering
    27        stage.  A few more per cent, up to 10 per cent, come via
    28        dairy products, shell fish and that type of food.  The
    29        incidence of food poisoning attributed to red meat is what
    30        is left.  My arithmetic is suspect but it comes to
    31        one per cent or one-half of one per cent.
    32
    33   Q.   Of all food poisoning incidents?
    34        A.  Of Salmonella, I think.
    35
    36   Q.   I was only giving Salmonella as an example.  In the
    37        spectrum of all food poisoning incidents, whether
    38        Salmonella or other, apart from chicken, red meat is a
    39        significant source of food poisoning?
    40        A.  Not at all.  We have dealt with Salmonella and shown
    41        that red meat is involved in a minuscule proportion of
    42        cases.  We can deal with whatever other type of food
    43        poisoning you would ask me about.
    44
    45   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  What band of seriousness did 30,000 cases
    46        cover?  It is one for every 2,000 members of the population
    47        of this country, very broadly speaking?
    48        A.  Yes, it is measured in groups of 100,000 so that would
    49        be 10, 15, would it not, per 100,000, yes, of that order.
    50 
    51   Q.   Yes, but at one end there might be a fatality or fatalities 
    52        down to what, just any case which the person has felt 
    53        unwell enough to go to the doctor who has thought fit
    54        enough to make enquiry which has identified the organism?
    55        A.  I am sorry, yes.  The symptoms of food poisoning,
    56        generally, are sickness and diarrhoea and feeling generally
    57        unwell.  In the vast majority of cases that is the sum of
    58        it.
    59
    60        In certain target populations, if I could add, that is,

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