Volume 7: Medicines and Cosmetics
1. Introduction and overview
Scope of this volume

1.1 Our collection of earlier volumes on animal health and human health (Volumes 3-6) looks at the sequence of events as BSE emerged and spread, and in particular at the measures taken to counter the threat it posed through the food chain to other animals and to humans. Volume 6, on human health, also reviews the action taken with rather less publicity to address hazards for those handling animals and their products - the 'occupational risks'.

1.2 The present volume is concerned mainly with a third potential pathway for BSE infection, where measures were again taken without much attendant publicity - veterinary and human medicines using animal tissues. There was particular concern over those that were injected, since it was well-established that injection or application to open wounds was usually a swifter and more effective route for transmission of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) agents than when they were eaten. For the sake of simplicity, it focuses on products using bovine materials, though there were parallel concerns about material from sheep and goats and some of the action taken also applied to this.

1.3 The volume then goes on to review action taken on cosmetics and toiletries, which shared features with topical medicines such as ointments and lotions but were not covered by the provisions of the Medicines Act.

1.4 It concludes by examining the events that surrounded the failure to prepare a comprehensive overview of all possible ways in which bovine material might present risks of transmitting the BSE agent - what came to be termed an audit of uses of bovine tissues. The charts we have constructed and annexed to Chapter 9 illustrate just how extensively bovine material was used, though this was not immediately appreciated. They also show the complex interaction of the many industries involved, the degree of recycling and the various ultimate disposal outlets.

1.5 Different regulatory regimes applied to these activities, which were the province of a variety of Government Departments and agencies and separate tiers of local government. A glance through the summaries in vol. 14: Responsibilities for Human and Animal Health will reveal how tenuous a relationship many of these approaches and provisions bore to one another.