Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have identified any potential risk to human health from Mycoplasma bovis.

Through the Animal and Plant Health Agency, the Government is aware of the current situation of Mycoplasma bovis in cattle in England, Wales and Scotland and has funded work on Mycoplasma species. This work is published and information about Mycoplasma bovis has been made available to livestock owners through the Cattle Health and Welfare Group and various pharmaceutical companies.

The disease has been recorded in the UK since 1974 and is more often associated with calf pneumonia than with its impact on milk production in the UK. The organism is host specific to cattle and has only ever been reported twice in man, in immunocompromised patients in both cases.

An assessment was carried out in 2010 on any links between animal Mycoplasmas and human health. The conclusion of the assessment was that human infections are very rare, but may have occurred and that the potential for human transmission could not be totally excluded.

The Minister of State for Farming, Food and Marine Environment has discussed individual cases of Mycoplasma bovis and their implications with the Chief Veterinary Officer during the course of the last twelve months, and we continue to monitor the disease.