EUROPEAN VIEW:THE EUROPEAN Food Safety Authority has given the Irish pork industry a much-needed boost by declaring that it has few concerns for human health arising from the contamination of some pork with dioxins.
In a statement that will provide comfort for Irish authorities and assuage the concerns of consumers, the authority said if a person ate an average amount of Irish pork every day since September 1st, 10 per cent of which was contaminated with the highest recorded concentration of dioxins, there would be no concern for human health.
In an extreme case, where someone ate a large amount of pork, 100 per cent contaminated with the highest recorded concentration of pork, it said the safety margin would be "considerably undermined". However, it added that the margins for acceptable weekly intake have a 10-fold safety margin, so while protection would be reduced, it "would not necessarily lead to adverse health effects".
The authority is an independent EU-funded agency, based in Parma, Italy. Its conclusions were welcomed by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, which said they confirmed the risk assessment taken by Irish authorities last weekend. By recalling all Irish pork and bacon products, the time of exposure to potentially contaminated product had been reduced, it said.
The Irish food authority now says it is reviewing the EU agency's risk assessment on composite products containing low levels of pork and is of the view that these pose minimal risk to consumer health. This could open the way to a progressive lifting of the ban on Irish pork, provided it has no connection with the tainted feed at the centre of the crisis, and starting with products which contain a low percentage of pork.
Alan Reilly, deputy chief executive of the Irish authority, said the opinion of the European authorities provided more reassurance to consumers that there was no cause for concern and any health risk was extremely low. He again defended the need for a blanket product recall as a precautionary measure to protect consumer health from products containing an illegal amount of dioxins.
The European authority said it based its conclusions on limited data provided by the commission in relation to contamination levels and took into account the fat content of products containing pork and consumption patterns across Europe. Its statement was based on the assumption that exposure at high levels began only in September 2008 and that effective measures had been taken to remove this excessive exposure from Irish pork and pork products.
It analysis shows the pork products with the highest levels of fat are suet/lard (90 per cent), salami (40 per cent) and white pudding (40 per cent).
The UK Food Standards Agency said the advice showed products containing pork like sausages and pizza could still be eaten.
