BSE rarely makes the headlines these days, but that looks set to change after a report in Nature that lamb might present an even greater risk to human health than beef. At present, the 'risk' is purely theoretical, and is based on two uncorroborated assumptions: that BSE has passed into sheep, and that it has spread through the United Kingdom's national flock. If this has happened, it is estimated that up to 100,000 people could die from eating contaminated lamb.

In fact, nobody really knows whether sheep have been affected by BSE. As the Daily Telegraph (UK, 10 January 2002) points out, this is partly because of “the recent fiasco in which scientists looking for BSE in the national flock spent four years studying cows' brains”. There is concern that the symptoms of BSE could be mistaken for those of the related sheep disease scrapie, thereby masking the true extent of the problem.

The researchers stress that their data represent a worst-case scenario, although team leader Neil Ferguson warns that “there has been rather too much complacency. That there is a potential risk has been known for the past five years” (The Mirror, UK, 10 January 2002).

The Food Standards Agency's official line is that “the risk of BSE in sheep remains theoretical and the agency is not advising against the consumption of lamb” (BBC News, 10 January 2002). However, those who remember similar statements being made about beef during the BSE crisis might not feel reassured. Frances Hall from the Human BSE Foundation says “a lot of families have been changing over to eating more lamb because of fears of BSE. If anyone in the future is found to have acquired the disease from sheep, they will have good reason to be extremely angry” (The Mirror).