Title; Contents; Acknowledgements; Introduction: seeking lessons from BSE/CJD for communication strategies on health and risk; A chronology of BSE policy in four countries and the European Community; Assessing public perception: issues and methods; Risk and trust: determinants of public perception; Sample surveys of public perceptions and opinion; The BSE and CJD crisis in the press; Risk communication strategies in public policy-making; Surveillance systems: their information and communication practices; Evolution and implications of public risk communication strategies on BSE
Improving communication strategies and engaging with public concerns
Summary
The BSE(bovine spongiform encephalopathy) saga has made painfully evident the limitations of risk communication as a one way avenue where information to the public about the risks they face come after critical policy decisions have already been made. In fact communication has even been identified as one of the key elements of what went wrong and generated the loss of trust in government discourse and in beef in Europe. Clearly there was a need to learn from that experience and share those lessons. This challenge was taken up by the WHO and a group of European scholars, with the support of DG R
