WRITTEN QUESTION No. 3662/98 by José GARCÍA-MARGALLO Y MARFIL The millennium bug
C 341/10 Official Journal of the European Communities EN 29. 11. 1999 (1999/C 341/012) WRITTEN QUESTION E-3582/98 by Alexandros Alavanos (GUE/NGL) to the Commission Subject: Ban on the use of antibiotics in animal feed (3 December 1998) Scientific findings discussed at a recent international medical congress in Copenhagen suggest that the uncontrolled use of antibiotics to fatten up animals and fish and for medicinal purposes poses a serious threat to the human immune system and human health. Since consumer health protection is a matter of top priority for the EU, will the Commission say whether it intends to take immediate measures to ban the use of antibiotics in animal feed? Answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission (4 February 1999) As the conclusions of the conference of the World Health Organisation in October 1997 in Berlin, of the Economic and Social Committee, of the International Office of Epizootics and of the conference on the microbial threat held in Copenhagen in September 1998 have underlined, resistance to antibiotics has to be regarded as a major, complex problem of international proportions. For their part, the Council and the Commission declared on 14 December 1998, at the meeting of Agriculture Ministers, that it was essential to prevent the development of resistance to the antibiotics used in human medicine. This statement reinforces the opinion expressed by the Commission and the Council at the meeting of Health Ministers on 12 November 1998. It is this general concern regarding resistance to antibiotics which led the Council, acting on the precautionary principle, to adopt on 17 December 1998 the proposal (1) submitted by the Commission concerning the prohibition of four antibiotics permitted in animal feed in order to confine their use or the use of antibiotics belonging to the same family exclusively to human medicine. At the request of the Commission, the scientific steering committee is to deliver a general opinion on the question of resistance to antimicrobic agents, taking into account the use of these substances in human and veterinary medicine, in animal feed and in the plant health sector. (1) COM(98) 763 final. (1999/C 341/013) WRITTEN QUESTION E-3662/98 by José García-Margallo y Marfil (PPE) to the Commission (7 December 1998) Subject: The millennium bug It has been established that the ‘millennium bug’, a problem also known as the ‘year 2000 effect’, may affect all types of programmable electronic systems (PESs), ranging from mainframe computers to microchips. These systems are employed for all nature of industrial purposes at the various stages of the production process, in the transport sector, in the public services and so forth. Furthermore, the said systems are date- dependent and their reaction on the first day of the new millennium will be critical. For those reasons, it would advisable to pinpoint the risks involved. Is specific cooperation of any kind under way between the Community administration and the national and local administration in each Member State, with a view to ensuring that the process of adapting systems runs smoothly and encounters no risks?