THE Phillips report has profound implications for everyone in Britain.

Because of the timescale involved in many dietary related diseases, it's vital we learn the lessons from this catastrophe, if only for the sake of our children.

For years, Viva! warned of the dangers from BSE; warnings based on the opinions of knowledgeable scientists -- the same scientists the Government ignored because they didn't like what they were saying. These scientists are still issuing warnings and still being ignored.

Lord Phillips has identified intensive farming as one of the primary causes of BSE, yet intensive farming continues.

Almost all pig meat, chicken and turkey is intensively reared indoors -- and even animals kept outdoors are increasingly being pushed beyond their ability to cope.

The result is a string of diseases that have to be controlled -- often not very successfully -- with antibiotics and other drugs.

The warning signs couldn't be clearer -- deadly, uncontrollable superbugs which threaten human health, virulent new strains of salmonella and E-coli and growing epidemics of food poisoning.

Major reports have warned of the catastrophe which beckons , but the survival of the meat industry has again been put before human health.

What we are doing to farmed animals is a welfare disaster -- but an imminent human disaster also.

Government must act urgently on the evidence that is staring us in the face -- modern, intensive farming is unnatural, unsustainable.

TONY WARDLE Deputy Director Viva! (Vegetarians International Voice for Animals), Brighton.