Belize has embarked on a Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) Surveillance program since the year 2000. However not much advances were made mainly due to lack of planning and organization. Several entities (BLPA, BAHA, MOA, OIRSA) have now come together in a coordinated effort to drastically improve with planning, organization and execution for the BSE Surveillance System to be successful.
This Surveillance System is considered very important because of the impact it has on trade with cattle. Also it is a disease known to affect humans.
There are three BSE Risk Status categories. Belize is currently on the lowest category known as UNDETERMINED. This means that Belize cannot trade cattle with countries that have a higher BSE risk status category. Therefore Belize has to implement all of the activities required to advance in status namely CONTROLLED Risk Status and subsequently NEGLIGIBLE Risk Status.
To advance in category the key elements consists of Farmers reporting to BLPA or BAHA any downer cattle or cattle showing nervous signs. Farmers will be trained on how to identify a suspicious case so as to facilitate reporting.
Each sample taken from a dead cattle will provide points to the point system. It is required that Belize accumulates 21,500 points. A good sample provides 750 points. Other key activities consists of testing animal feed to demonstrate the absence of ruminant protein in the feed. So far Belize has accumulated 17,350 points.
Once all the points have been achieved, a dossier will be submitted to The World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) for International Recognition of a CONTROLLED BSE Risk Status.
This achievement will open doors for the negotiation to trade cattle of all categories with trading partners.
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), also known as Mad Cow Disease, is a fatal disease of the nervous system that mainly affects cattle.
BSE is one of a group of diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE). Other TSEs include scrapie in sheep, chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk, and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans. A neurological disease in cats has been linked to BSE.
BSE is a notifiable disease to BAHA