An epidemic of Salmonella Brandenburg abortions in sheep in the South Island, peaking in 2000, and consequential increase in human cases and detections on sheep meat resulted in a "Quantitative risk assessment of Salmonella in sheep meat produced in New Zealand (Sal-QRA)". The Sal-QRA programme has identified the prevalence and levels on carcass meat of Salmonella after slaughter, and demonstrated a significant decrease during processing. Similarly, the failure to identify any cases-control association with consumption of sheep meat suggests that a foodborne route of infection is not contributing significantly to the burden of S. Brandenburg cases.