Cattle brain risk underestimated

London - Eating cattle brains may have put more people at risk of infection than was previously thought

London - Eating cattle brains may have put more people at risk of infection than was previously thought. Research commisioned by the British Ministry of Agriculture suggests many more people ate brains during the height of the BSE scare than had been realised. Scientists at Leatherhead Food Research Laboratory and the Meat and Livestock Commission say that up to 200,000 ox brains a year were sold as food in the 1980s.

The report also concluded that tongue sold in butchers' shops and beef blood used as fertiliser could have been infected.