Consequent upon the bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) crisis, the European Union (EU) Commission enacted various decisions, which demanded that all bovine animals over 30 months of age should be examined by one of the approved rapid tests when slaughtered for human consumption. All cattle over 24 months of age subject to 'special emergency slaughtering' or died on the farm or in transit or suspect of BSE infection should also be examined by one of the approved rapid tests. According to a specific commission decision, Sweden and Finland were to test only a sample of bovine animals over 30 months of age subject to normal slaughter. Testing commenced on 1 January 2001. The authors evaluate the results of more than 5 million tests performed in the second semester 2001 from across the EU. The prevalence of BSE in the risk categories considered (emergency slaughter, fallen stock and healthy slaughtered), and the probability distribution of true-positive, false-positive and false-negative results are estimated by second-order Bayesian analysis. The results of the validation of tests performed in the EU are also considered by estimation of the probability distribution of their sensitivity and specificity. The prevalence of infection estimated in the cattle population of each EU country is compared against the criteria given in the OIE Terrestrial Animal Health Code and is also used to evaluate the consistency of the results of EU Geographical BSE Risk with the actual infection levels in the countries. Finally, the capability of the two current approaches to BSE surveillance (i.e. the testing of all slaughtered and dead cattle as applied in the EU and a surveillance system targeted at animals in risk categories only) to detect the infection in a given population are discussed.