Figures for the first three months of this year show a steady decline in the number of animals with BSE.
Since January 1st, 2003, there have been 70 cases of the disease found here, compared with 116 for the same period last year.
The monthly totals for the past three months show that there were 29 cases in January, 18 in February and 23 this month.
In the corresponding period last year, the totals were 42 in January, 44 in February and 30 in March.
The first months of the year have tended to bring forward most of the cases as this is peak calving time and some experts believe that the stress of calving can hasten symptoms of the disease.
As in the previous two years since active surveillance was introduced, this programme of examining cattle over 30 months old and fallen and casualty animals has identified most of the cases.
Since the beginning of the year, 43 of the 70 cases found were in fallen cattle - animals which had died and were brought to knackeries for destruction.
Six of the animals found with BSE in this quarter were identified in the 124,234 Enfer tests carried out on animals over 30 months old slaughtered in meat plants.
No cases of the disease were found in casualty animals.
The active surveillance programme was put in place in July 2000 and since then over 1.48 million tests have been carried out: 662,000 in 2001, 668,000 in 2002 and 134,000 so far this year.
The latest cases - there were three new ones this week - confirm the underlying trend that the disease is mainly confined in an older subset of animals which may have been exposed to contaminated meat and bonemeal prior to 1996. In that year moves were made to separate the manufacture of pig and poultry food, which could legally contain meat and bonemeal, from cattle rations, from which meat and bonemeal were banned in 1998.