Volume 1: Findings and Conclusions
8. Occupational risk

1031 We turn now to the important matter of occupational risk from BSE. This largely escaped the limelight, save briefly when it seemed that farmers might be particularly vulnerable to CJD. Contact with live animals and with their tissues was a well-known disease hazard. One of the early steps taken by MAFF was to issue detailed advice to its staff on precautions to take if they were if in contact with bovine material. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) warned farmers and hauliers about the risk of aggressive behaviour in any BSE-affected animals they were handling.