The incidence of BSE has fallen dramatically since the early 1990s. However confirmed BSE figures do not necessarily present an accurate picture of the disease as many cattle carrying BSE may have been slaughtered before the disease could be identified.

So far 4.5m cattle have been slaughtered in the UK under the government's 30 month scheme, introduced in 1996. A further 77,000 have been culled under the government’s selective culling scheme - introduced in early 1997. Several thousand more cattle have been slaughtered, or are awaiting slaughter, under the BSE offspring cull, which was introduced in 1999.