Phil Hogan confident over upcoming BSE result
If the laboratory findings come back positive, it will be the first case of the disease to have been confirmed in Ireland since 2013. The case centres on a five-year-old Rotbunt cow which was found dead on a dairy farm close to Louth village.
The animal was not presented for slaughter and did not enter the food chain.
European Agriculture Commissioner Phil Hogan said if the situation remains as it is — one isolated case — he did not foresee a difficulty for Ireland’s disease status.
He also told Sinn Féin TD Martin Ferris at a meeting of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture that if that is the position he did not see any impact on the country’s export potential.
“There are always a few isolated cases around the EU and as long as it is not a significant number in any particular regional location it should be fairly okay,” he said.
Mr Hogan said there is, of course, an anxious time for the industry as it awaits the results to come back.
The case was identified through the Department of Agriculture’s ongoing surveillance system on fallen animals.
