CNN breaking news email alert - US cow tests positive for mad cow disease

[Shakespeare]

No link yet, but will post as soon as one is available. Here's the text of the email:

-- U.S. agriculture officials say tests on cow in the United States have come
back positive for mad cow disease.

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Am I surprised? Noooope. And I'm betting it's closer to cows (plural), and not just "cow."

Edited to include CNN link: http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/06/24/mad.cow.ap/index.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Tests have confirmed mad cow disease in a U.S. cow previously cleared of having the brain wasting illness, the Agriculture Department said Friday. It is the second case of mad cow disease in the United States.

An internationally recognized laboratory in Weybridge, England, confirmed the case of mad cow disease after U.S. tests produced conflicting results, Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns said.

Human health was not at risk, Johanns said. The animal was a "downer," meaning it was unable to walk. Such animals are banned from the food supply.

New tests were ordered two weeks ago. Those results came back positive, leading officials to seek confirmation from the Weybridge lab. The department also performed more tests at its lab in Ames, Iowa.

[SteppingRazor]

1. Is Mad Cow really a big deal?

I've heard of only a bare handful of cases where human health has been affected by consumption of MadCow-tainted meat. Is this really something we should even be concerned about?

[slamthecrank]

2. Yes.

This is the same cow that's been tested over and over again - not really news.

And, yes, Mad-Cow tainted meat is no issue to be taken lightly. Unless you talk to someone from the meat industry. Consider your sources and do some research.

[ElectroPrincess]

37. I admit that growing up in South Dakota and Nebraska ...

I loved to regularly enjoying a good steak, medium rare. I even attempted to convert my vegetarian roommate in college by giving her an "Omaha Steaks" catalog.

Now in my middle age, I realize what an insensitive a**hole I was for not being more in tune to both animal rights and this horrible brain disease. :blush:

Eat more chicken! That now rings true.

Despite the fact that our poultry is plumped up with hormones, methinks it's much more prudent to convert to white meat or fish.

BTW - flash video site below of a "Mad Cow" is hilarious but please note = *profanity warning*

http://www.extremefunnyhumor.com/fun_madcow.htm

[Vanje]

66. Its news!

"This is the same cow that's been tested over and over again - not really news."

This cow was in the news last November as being "cleared of BSE".
Same cow that was cleared turns out to have the disease when subjected to a more accurate test than the USDA considers necessary.

Moral of story: The US screening test for mad cow is inadequate.

Heres another twist. This animal has a different strain of BSE than the famous Washington Holstein did. The latest mad cow is a beef breed.
As far as I've read, the original herd of this animal is unknown. If they know, they aint saying.
The shit is probably still out there somewhere.
If cattle prion is anything like sheep prion, once a herd has an infected member, they can spread it between herd members.

The recent mad cow may have been shedding prions into the environment for 8 years.

[doodadem]

3. It is much more than a handful of cases in Europe

And now, there is some indication that the skyrocketing rate of Alheimers cases in this country is being misdiagnosed, and many could actually be Mad Cow related.

[SteppingRazor]

10. Here's the CDC's numbers...

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/diseases/cjd/bse_cjd.htm

According to them, 147 cases of Creutzfeldt Jakob occured in the UK in a decade (1995-2004), plus 7 cases in France and 1 each in Ireland, Canada and the US. In each of those last three cases the victim had recently visited the UK.

I'm not saying vCJD isn't a bad way to go. Nor am I saying we shouldn't be testing cows for this. I'm just saying that it appears to be almost completely under control.

Also, it appears that the only way to contract it is through consumption of cow brains, spinal column, retina, or other "yuckkies."

[Heddi]

15. But people don't get CJD from eating brains

they get vCJD from eating ground meat that has been contaminated with brains, spinal column, etc.

So it's not like people are sitting in a restaurant saying 'Oh yes..I'd like one spinal column, medium rare, with a cerebrospinal fluid gravy on the side, please"---the meat they ate was muscle that was contaiminated with the spinal/brain/etc matter. Which of course is due to lacadasial attitudes towards meat preparation and slaughter. Same as e.Coli and salmonella infections---they can be prevented if one is dilligent, however, slaughterhouses (and the companies that own them) have a "kill and pack as many as you can in as short amount of time as possible" attitdue and to hell with HAACP and other precautionary measures. So what if a few kids get sick from e.Coli? At least we increased our pack rate by 80% last year....

[warrens]

21. AMR

Automatic Meat Recovery. Basically, it's a big rake that scrapes the last scraps off the spinal column. It should be illegal. Plus they allow things called beef cheeks, which are something like what they sound like, and they're scraped off the skull.

[dissent1977]

17. There are almost certainly far more cases than what you suggest

Symptoms of Creutzfeldt Jakob usually do not show up until years after the tainted beef is consumed. It is in fact possible that you, or anyone else who eats beef for that matter, consumed tainted beef a decade ago and are still not seeing the symptoms of it.

And while it is true that the brain, and spinal cord are the primary sources for prions, the current slaughtering practices often result in bits of those parts getting mixed in with the "good" meat.

This is a very serious issue, and however much the government tries to downplay it we should take it very seriously.

[uppityperson]

55. Hot dogs, sausages, steak like t-bone/porterhouse

all contain either "bits" or part of/next to spine that is easily contaminated.

[BrendaStarr]

59. In Europe they didn't worry about it until it was too late, either.

BTW, the New York Time article http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/25/national/25cow.html

Makes it clear that the USDA has been using faulty testing on this for years and has not instituted the reforms it said it would over a year ago.

Yeah, I'll be eating more chicken and fish now.

[Vanje]

70. Prions concentrate in lymphoid tissues

"Also, it appears that the only way to contract it is through
consumption of cow brains, spinal column, retina, or other "yuckkies."

Theres a project underway where I work to come up with a way to diagnose TSE (prion disease)in live animals. We use Prion infected sheep as our models.
We're getting prion concentration in lymph tissues.
And blood. And vagus nerve.

[kestrel91316]

63. Google "BASE" + Alzheimer's +"bovine amyloidotic spongiform encephalopathy

The new form of BSE found in Italy sounds suspiciously like a bovine form of our Alzheimer's disease.

[Bridget Burke]

5. Creutzfeld Jacob is a horrible way to die.

And correct regulation of the beef industry could totally remove tainted meat as a cause of the disease.

[pandemic_1918]

6. No Tests No Positives

You don't hear about mad cow in the US because the US tests as few as possible, This will cause some major problems. Where are the rest of the Texas steers from this herd? Some if not most have already been eaten.

The firewalls are a joke and more will realize what the USDA double speak really means.

[kestrel91316]

64. The USDA doesn't WANT to find the rest of the iceberg...........

so far they have just found the "tip" with their testing of downers. I said on another thread that testing only downers for BSE is akin to only testing gay men with Kaposi's sarcoma for HIV. Think you might miss a few???? If they were to test ramdom specimens that were young rather than old, and healthy rather than sick or down, I can just about guarantee you they will find plenty.

I LOVE beef, but haven't eaten much in the last 8-10 years. After reading "Brain Trust" by Colin somebody-or-other I basically am unwilling to eat any more non-organic or non-grass-fed beef. I do not trust the USDA.

Oh, and by the way, I am a veterinarian with a BS in Microbiology. I know my germs and my neuro diseases. When I semiretire from practice I hope to join the beleaguered (sp?) ranks of USDA veterinarians of the sort who apparently went over the heads of the politicos to get this testing done. I think they will be needing lots more of us in the future to deal with the Mad Cow problem. And the more who are rabblerousers, the better.

[barb162]

13. yes, especially if you get it...what a miserable death

[Kraklen]

16. Yes and no.

Chances of getting it are likely still low. Some 50 or so British citizens contracted it during their outbreak.

But there's more unknowns here in the states. Here our officials are just crossing their fingers and hoping it goes away. So there could be a huge outbreak for all we know.

There could be prions eating away at your brain right now and you'd never know it.

Hell of a disease.

[Julius Civitatus]

18. Damn yes! -- The cattle industry has muddied the info out there. Beware.

The cattle industry, as well as a bunch of paid right-wing "think tanks" (cough Cato cough) have been muddying the waters, trying to make it look as if mad cow is not that bad, or inoffensive to humans.

Beware!

It's a very complex neurological disease, but let me simplify it to a bare-bones explanation:

• Mad Cow, or Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) is a serious neurological disease that literally eats away the brain and nervous system of cows. It was rare disease that only affected sheep (Scrapie), but it jumped species when the cattle industry started to use the ground meat of diseased animals to fatten cows (sick, I know).
  
  
• It is caused by a prion (a mutated, defective type of protein), therefore it's not an "infection" per se. There's also no cure, no vaccine or remedy.
  
  Some people can contract the prion by eating the meat of BSE diseased cows, and may (in rare occasions) develop a human variety of the disease called Creutzfeldt Jakob disease. It acts like mad cow, eating away the brain and nervous tissue with tiny bubbles of matter. It can take years between ingestion of the prion and development of the disease. It's an awful, slow, horrible way to go.
  :scared:
  
  Researchers are very puzzled by this disease, its connection to BSE, and the conditions that make a small part of the population contract the disease. The latest research points to a genetic predisposition. Some people may be vulnerable, some people may be not.
  
  
• After the mad cow scare in the UK ten years ago, nearly 200 people died of Creutzfeldt Jakob disease in the UK.

For more info, check these reliable sources:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/mad_cow.html

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/madcow/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_cow

Beware of websites funded by the cattle industry and right-wing institutes. They would tell you BSE doesn't exist or claim that BSE is a "myth." They are, in my opinion, criminally negligent liars. But that's just my opinion.

Me? I gave up red meat ten years ago since the BSE scare in Europe. I don't regret it.

[MisterP]

72. for more on Cato and friends, read "Trust Us, We're Experts"

and the earlier "Toxic Sludge is Good for You." Tom Tomorrow illustrated the covers: you can't go wrong!

[shockra]

19. Hundreds of articles on Mad Cow, CJD, etc.

http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow.htm

[TheWraith]

33. No, not really.

While we by all means need proper regulation of the beef industry, and efforts should be made to eradicate the condition, it's really not the threat that some paranoid persons and anti-meat agitators make out of it. In the U.K., during their decades-long "outbreak," only about 200 people contracted the disease. Compared the number of people who ate meat, in a badly-controlled environment like they had, you're thousands of times more likely to die from a heart attack, car accident, etcetera. Put more colorfully, a UK beef-eater during the outbreak was only about 3-4 times more likely to die of VCJD than of spontaneous human combustion. There's even some evidence that you need a genetic predisposition to the disease to get it. So realistically, despite the inadequate controls on the beef industry, the threat is next to zero. It's like terrorism--despite the fact that Homeland Security is incompetant, there aren't bombs going off on every airplane, because the threat has been wildly exaggerated.

[dissent1977]

39. How do you know only 200 people contracted the disease?

After all it can take years for any symptoms of Mad Cow to show up after the contaminated meat is consumed. Someone could have the disease for over a decade before they even realize it. The beef industry has been trying to downplay the threat of Mad Cow Disease for years, and when they show you these low numbers it is meant to deceive you. There are certainly more than 200 people who contracted the disease, but most of them probably don't realize they contracted it yet.

[TheWraith]

75. Because I listen to facts, not to wild speculation and paranoia.

There's a hundred times as much bullshit running in this thread as there has ever been out of the beef industry, and that is saying something. To listen to most of the people here, if you so much as look at a burger you're condemning yourself and your children to slow death and eventual zombification.

As for the number of infectees, it's really rather simple. The UK stomped out the largest part of their BSE problem in the 90s, after those infected with VCJD to manifest. There have been 147 VCJD cases in the UK in the last ten years. Considering that those were infected years earlier, before the problem was understood and more effectively dealt with, the numbers would be far less now.

Statistically, you have a much higher chance of dying from choking on a tough steak than you do of contracting VCJD. On a practical level, the problem was small before, and with reasonable care in terms of feeding, it's not a problem at all. "Mad Cow," while something that needs to be watched and dealt with, is far more of a soapbox for anti-meat advocates than it is even close to being a real threat.

[emcguffie]

43. We no longer buy any ground beef.

The disease can take a long time to show up, so conceivably a lot of us could have it already...

It's a very unpleasant way to go. You certainly wouldn't want your children to get it.

Ground beef is what is particularly risky, I think. If you want hamburgers, you should buy chuck or sirloin or whatever and grind it yourself -- you don't want any nerve tissue to get in.

In the industry they use these bone crushers to recover every little atom of meat from the bones. These bone crushers are not supposed to let nerve tissue get in the meat, but whenever they've been tested -- or up to a year and a half ago, when I read this -- they have indeed let nerve tissue get by.

The US FDA refused to allow a small, high-end beef producing company to test all their cows, so they could keep selling to Japan -- where they already test all of their cattle.

The FDA, under Ann Veneman, said no, you can't do that. It would set a bad example!

Better safe than sorry.

[BrainRants]

4. Yup, right on time! Friday news dump!

Surprise, Surprise, Surprise!

[kestrel91316]

65. Just what I said................

I heard it on NPR news right before 2 PM here on the West Coast, so it was right before 5 PM in DC. Typical.

Have I mentioned yet today how much I HATE THESE PEOPLE?????

[justinsb]

7. Time to close the Canadian border

to US beef exports

[Siyahamba]

28. I hope they do.

Just to see the hypocrisy that would arise from US politicians.

[RPM]

8. awwwww shit - and I have some steaks to grill tonight....

thanks a bundle.... :cry:

[PartyPooper]

58. There goes Atkins! And the prices for chicken and fish will skyrocket!

Prices for pork surely will go up, too.

:scared:

:cry:

[FlemingsGhost]

9. I was wondering when the health-related fears would begin again

Three can't miss gems from the Department of Keep the Homeland Scared Shitless:

1. Children, oh ... think of the children: Missing ones always do nicely

2. "At least you have your health": Or do you?

3. Terror, terror, terror!: Cry it, call it, whisper it. The boogeyman is coming for you and your family.

Boy, Americans are fools ...

[KittyWampus]

11. This Is Deadly Serious. If You Want To Ignore It, The It's Questionable

who is really being foolish.

[FlemingsGhost]

14. Yes ... and the sky is falling, too..

Be afraid.

[dissent1977]

20. No the sky is not falling, but tainted beef is being sold to Americans

There has been a wide range of research done on this issue, check out John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton's writings for the Center for Media and Democracy if you want a good overview.

Deny the existence of Mad Cow disease all you want, but the facts show it does pose a serious threat. The beef industry and the Department of Agriculture are not on the side of public health, they are on the side of profit. Just because they say everything is fine does not mean it is.

[Julius Civitatus]

25. BSE is a serious issue, independently of hype or fears

This should be an issue completely separated form the mendacious terror alerts that the Bush admin. has been issuing overt he last few years. BSE is a potentially serious issue, and I don't' they are taking it seriously enough.

[BrendaStarr]

60. Yeah, lets just ignore this

Seems like the in thing to do.

Oh now really do you think I mean it?

I just wanted to post this

Toon!

[humus]

62. which came first tthe mad cow or the mad leader?

"...our country is not being destroyed by
bad politics, it is being destroyed by a bad way
of life. Bad politics is merely another result."
-- Wendell Berry

[Skwmom]

12. Isn't the law being changed to allow "downer" cows into the food chain?

[warrens]

23. They tried, but failed

They were just about to get it passed when this test came back.

[truebrit71]

32. Hate to break it to you guys but the phrase "didn't enter the food chain".

...is the bovine equivalent of " but I didn't inhale"...

Mad Cow has been here for a while, but it has been covered up and mis-diagnosed, this is only going to get worse.

[stray cat]

22. The key is this cow is not believe to be imported.

This sounds like it is our own endogenous American Mad Cow Disease. It causes disease in humans that can look like Alzheimers but with more rapid progression

[warrens]

24. Some background

That test came back inconclusive using the IHC test in November. So they did another IHC test, which is highly subjective and can be thrown off by something as simple as the water used, etc. They also used a frozen brain sample, which is not a good idea. They flat out refused to do the Western blot test until the Inspector General ordered them to. I doubt that this is the only case in the U.S.

[jayfish]

26. Isn't This A Couple Of Weeks Old.

No bad on the OP, just wondering why the media is so excited about it now. Oh yeah, it's to cover-up all of todays bad news.

Jay

[hvn_nbr_2]

27. Look on the bright side... :sarcasm:

If it eats your brain, Frist and Jebbie will keep you alive with a feeding tube.

[mom cat]

35. It also occurred to me that it's most likely to develop in the Red States.

Oopsie I meant to say the "Red Meat States".
Go easy on the barbecue y'all. We liberals need all the brainpower we can muster!

[ginnyinWI]

29. I looked at it this way:

Do I trust the U.S. government? No. So should I trust them when they say that the beef supply is safe? Hell no.

I stopped eating beef about five years ago. It's also not good for you, anyway, so that's another reason.

[Patty Diana]

30. This is old news, that's been buried_torture photo and DSM diversion

Rove's didn't work. I'm suspect at the timing of the St Louis explosion also!!

[SlavesandBulldozers]

31. just for the record.

should anybody ever hear about me getting Mad-Cow disease, please don't let the fundies keep me around as a zombie, but "toss me inside a hefty, and put me in the ground."

because I'm not going to be able to stop eating steak. and as long as the CJD doesn't get me for 8 years - hey, that's a steak well spent ;)

so how about that DSM?

[Arugula Latte]

34. I'm sorry, but I feel smug now.

I haven't eaten beef for about 24 years. Nor pork.

[RebelOne]

40. Same here. I do not eat anything with hair, fur or feathers.

I do eat seafood, but I'm trying to wean myself off that also, especially with all the reports of mercury in fish.

[Gyre]

36. Like anybodys gonna notice if Americans have

brains like swiss cheese!

Gyre

[lapfog_1]

38. Folks interested in this thread should read this

http://www.newstarget.com/002452.html

Now, I'm not a mad tinfoil hatter on this, and don't buy the conclusions
of this article, but one has to wonder WHY the USDA would PROHIBIT meat
packers from funding their own testing for BCE. I certainly can't think
of a good reason.

[kestrel91316]

67. Why not??

Gee, could it maybe be that said testing would reveal that we have an SERIOUS, EXTENSIVE problem with BSE right here in River City???

Naw..........we're Christians. Christian cows don't get BSE, only them sinner cows owned by fags get BSE. Right??

sarcasm off

[JoFerret]

41. Insist on GRASS fed beef

...corn destroys cows stomachs.

[nine30]

50. Not really.

What ultimately destroys their stomachs is this :









http://www.ca4a.org/info/slaughterhouse/

[arikara]

42. The only reason that they haven't found more cows with the disease

is that they refuse to test any except the downers. A cow that is infected with the disease is on its last legs when it becomes a "downer". They know darn well that there are many sick animals entering the food chain that aren't yet showing symptoms.

And there is no way to kill the prion even by sterilization. The disease is far more widespread than is reported. My 69 year old father who should be enjoying his retirement has dementia and is getting worse very quickly. I often wonder but I'm also afraid to find out...

Here's the book Mad Cow USA as a free e-book:

http://www.prwatch.org/books/madcow.html

[kestrel91316]

69. I have a 63-yr old British client..............

with severe dementia which has practically destroyed his life and his wife's in the past 18 months. He last went to the UK over 10 years ago, so he could have been there when they had the BSE problem. I am so angry at the lackadaisical attitude in the US government about this threat to us all.

Oh silly arikara............didn't you know the reason they only test downers is that if it's still standing it can't possibly have BSE??? And that poor downer only got infected minutes before it went down. There are no asymptomatic carriers with BSE. It's just the scientists' imaginations running wild. Faith trumps science once more. Praise Jeebus.

[depakid]

44. If you do the stats

I bet you would find that for every cow that's identified, 20 or more have sliped through the system....

[Dover]

45. Can this be avoided by eating grass fed beef from Whole Foods

or other grocer/meat market? Wondering if their cows are processed differently, etc.

[nine30]

49. Processed Humans.

"..cows are processed.."

Unbelievable, how humans have become so desensitized to the concept of animal 'products', as if animals are crops that are grown and later harvested, or unearthed from a mine.

When it was discovered the Nazis ran factories for manufacturing products out of human skin and bones('Processed Humans' if you will ), the reaction was of horror and outright disgust that lives to this day. But walk through a super market, past isle after isle of mutilated animals being sold under shrink wrap, nary a head turns.

[TheWraith]

73. Apples/oranges, and dead wrong to boot.

For one thing, the Nazi's never had factories for manufacturing products out of human anything. There is, I believe, a couple of custom made human-skin lampshades that were made for particularly twisted SS officers, but that's it. And equating human beings with animals, as well implicitly claiming that eating meat is the same as cannibalism, is obnoxious and crazy.

[nine30]

46. This is great news !

Treat animals like objects.. meat mounted on legs. What do you expect ??

[XemaSab]

47. Here's the deal:

it takes a long time for BSE to show up, even in cattle.

Most cows are killed and eaten before the disease manifests in the cow, especially since most cows are likely to be exposed to BSE not out on the range, but while being "finished", or confined in a feedlot for the last few weeks to be fattened.

BSE isn't going to show up in the last few weeks or months of the cow's life, but it's like AIDS: it can still infect you, even in small concentrations.

Genetic studies have been done that have found that a single hamburger patty can contain meat from HUNDREDS of cows, so if one infected cow gets into the food chain the meat can kill many, many people.

The FDA's meat safety standards are a joke. E. coli results from contamination with cow shit. If the packers can't keep cow shit out of the meat, how much real effort is being taken to ensure that brains and spinal tissue are not getting into the meat?

Answer: not much.

The FDA and the Department of Agriculture are afraid to test for mad cow for fear that testing will HURT THE BEEF INDUSTRY. That should show you right there how much these agencies really care about keeping BSE out of the food chain. Only you can protect yourself and your family from BSE. The easy way? Don't eat ground beef.

[Oreegone]

48. Ethical Cattle Ranchers will tell you this is a problem

A very big problem. A friend of mine who is very active in trying to stem the almost certain tide of this disease has been concerned for years. You ask if this is really a problem? Do you not remember how many cows had to be destroyed in Europe? Put a lot of people out of business.

Many other countries know where every darned cow is and that it is tested. There is a massive coverup as to the number of cases. I have seen 2 obits in my local paper in the last several years.
Both Jacobs-Crutchfield. Both autopsed and confirmed. So you ever see that as a cause of death in your neighborhood?

[Megahurtz]

51. Ew!

Ick!:puke:

[Lorien]

52. Glad I gave it up ten years ago

I REALLY don't miss it when I read stuff like this!

[lazarus]

53. and you're still at

a much, much, much higher risk of catching a disease because the guy at McD's didn't wash his hands after he took a piss.

[Hekate]

54. I just cannot convince my kids to stop eating beef

Very scary.

I was very much hoping that Japan would absolutely refuse to take any more of our beef until we got our act cleaned up, but instead the Bush admin has just leaned on the Japanese govt all the harder.

I have a sickening hunch that this story is one that will run under the radar of the MSM and the majority of Americans until a critical mass of human infection is reached--rather like HIV/AIDS.

But with the added motive of obscene profits for major contributors to the BFEE.

Hekate

[uppityperson]

56. This is good, means the system is working. Read labels

See, it was caught, that means the system is working and everything is OK. SEVERE :sarcasm:

Beware: Meat bits are used in sausage and hotdogs as well as ground beef. Read your labels, meat eaters!

[fortyfeetunder]

57. We're basically doomed

We've got a non-sterilizable substance in meat, and no clue to the extent of contamination.

Ai yi yi...

[stepnw1f]

61. World Tribunal in Istanbul Occured Today

http://www.worldtribunal.org/main/?

[MrSlayer]

68. I had two perfect 6 oz. bacon wrapped filet mignon cuts tonight.

I'm simply not going to panic over this. Hopefully it will drive the price of beef down and I will reap the benefits.

[NIGHT TRIPPER]

71. don't panic-your brain just gets swiss cheese holes in it-eat up, enjoy

Alzheimer symptoms, you won't know what hit you because you lose your memory.
Prions can't be killed or "cooked out".
The main food supply has been contaminated for years. Why do you think the prominent politicians NEVER eat from the common food supply.
But even Reagan had special cows raised for his BarBQues...
and we know what happened to him--only he never knew.

[MadisonProgressive]

74. How do they know the cow is pissed?

[carincross]

76. quickie tests can protect

While the US is doing some testing, it still refuses to do the quick tests that are being used in the rest of the world. This makes no sense. It adds $50 to the cost of a $2000 animal and offers assurance that "mad cow" is not getting into the food supply. Some months ago a small, private cattle company tried to initiate such testing so that it could export its beef to Japan. But the Ag Dept. refused to allow it to do the testing...... Now this.

[LiberalAndProud]

77. Faith-based mad cow policy.

http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_pg=46&u_sid=1445522

Michael Hansen crowed a little Friday after U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns announced that a lab in another country had confirmed a case of mad cow disease that Department of Agriculture scientists had initially missed.

Hansen, a senior researcher at the New York-based Consumers Union, had been harping on the USDA for months to expand its testing protocol for bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease. The nonprofit, independent Consumers Union advocated using a test known as the Western blot and getting a confirmation test from scientists in Weybridge, England.

Responding to Hansen in a letter in March, USDA officials said they were confident in their own lab technicians and that a Western blot test wouldn't have "enhanced the result of our November 2004 testing of a sample which had produced inconclusive results."

"In both of those areas," Hansen said, "they turned out to be wrong."

-snip-

"USDA's strategy is basically to cross its fingers and hope that beef from a BSE-infected animal doesn't end up on Americans' dinner plates," said Caroline Smith DeWaal, food safety director for the Center for Science in the Public Interest. "Call it a faith-based mad cow policy."

[noel711]

78. It's out there folks....

I'm a minister... last year I was called upon to say a funeral for a woman in a nearby rural community. When I asked the funeral director the cause of death, she said: Jakob Kreutzfeld...
Now, that just doesn't come from a mosquito bite. What shocked me more was that the family/community wasn't outraged..