Sunday, February 10, 2013

More on horse meat scandal

I am currently in the UK and suffering from the inevitable personal clock disruption caused by long international flights, so I've been watching the BBC news, which is reporting new revelations on the horse meat scandal.

Some manufactured meat products, such as lasagna, have been found to contain not just traces of horse meat, but consisted of 100% horse meat.  This is obviously not accidental and is almost certainly a deliberate intention to defraud.

Though not yet proven, it appears that the horse meat entered the French food industry via a shipment of so- called beef from an abattoir in Romania.

As I noted in a previous post, there is probably no health issue, though concern has been raised that the horses could have been treated with animal remedies that might still be present in the meat.

This story will remain in the headlines - there are calls for bans on import of meat from Europe, but this is not possible under the European single market rules.  One thing is certain; the story will continue to unfold for some time.