In approving this proposal, Parliament made another contribution to improving food safety in the EU. MEPs adopted amendments designed to broaden the scope of the proposed regulation so that it includes not only poultry, as proposed by the Commission, but also pigs, sheep, calves and other cattle. Another amendment is designed to make it possible to prevent any Member State that does not have an approved control programme in place within the stipulated period from selling certain products on the internal market, a measure regarded as crucial to enforce uniform safety levels throughout the single market.
In approving the second proposal, MEPs recognised that zoonoses (diseases spread from animals to humans) were a major public health issue in the Community. Amendments were adopted emphasising the need to monitor antimicrobial resistance and to ensure that the directive covers the whole food chain, including animal feed and breeding animals. MEPs also called for the directive to include the monitoring of plant products. Finally, they stressed that the overall consumption of antibiotics should be reduced as soon as possible, as infections were becoming more or less incurable despite the use of antibiotics.