U.S. BEEF HAS MAD COW. Bush Admin. lied to U.S. & Japan

[Sarah Ibarruri]

I am so sick of this evil administration. They've been not testing our food supply beef and now it's come out that the beef supply has mad cow after all. How many more lies will this administration tell us?


TOKYO (Reuters) - Shock and worry spread in Japan on Saturday after Tokyo reimposed a ban on U.S. beef imports over mad cow concerns. One leading fast food chain shelved plans to resume serving a popular beef dish and consumers said they felt betrayed.

Japan, the biggest foreign market for American beef, last month lifted a ban on imports imposed in 2003 after a U.S. case of mad cow disease. The ban had become an irritant in otherwise close bilateral ties, prompting strong pressure from Washington.

Tokyo finally lifted the ban under strict conditions, including stipulations that materials believed to carry a higher risk of mad cow disease, such as spinal cord tissue, be removed.

Officials said on Friday, however, that a total of 390 kg (860 lbs) of beef imported from a New York meatpacker had been found to contain spinal material when it was inspected at Tokyo's Narita airport.

The announcement raised questions about the initial decision to lift the ban and the overall trustworthiness of U.S. products, topics sure to be high on the agenda when U.S. Deputy Secretary of State

Robert Zoellick visits Japan from late Saturday.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said he would lodge a protest with Zoellick when they meet next week, Kyodo news said, while Foreign Minister Taro Aso was quoted as saying that the management system for beef exports would have to be firmly established before there could be any talk of resuming trade.

Consumers said they were worried.

"I feel a little betrayed," said Takayoshi Sakamoto, 34, who works for a personnel

"They promised they would check things, but this is what happened," he added. "I can tell you that even when U.S. beef is back on the shelves again, I won't really want to buy it."

Fast food chain Yoshinoya said it was postponing an eagerly awaited resumption of sales of its signature "gyudon" -- marinated, stewed beef on rice -- planned for mid-February.






TOKYO (AP) - Japanese stores ditched American beef products Saturday amid renewed mad cow fears and officials demanded an explanation after a contaminated meat shipment prompted Japan to restore a U.S. beef import ban.

Japan announced late Friday it was halting all American beef imports after inspectors found cattle backbone material in a beef shipment from Atlantic Veal & Lamb Inc., just weeks after Tokyo lifted its two-year ban on U.S. beef.

Japanese officials reacted angrily.

"The impermissible has happened," Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said Saturday in Shimonoseki, southern Japan.

"Japan will certainly not resume imports until investigations into the matter are complete," Abe said, adding he would lodge a protest with Deputy Secretary of State Robert B. Zoellick at a meeting on Monday.

Zoellick was scheduled to arrive in Japan Saturday to discuss a range of political and economic issues with senior Japanese officials.

Abe's comments came as the U.S. announced it would dispatch a delegation of agricultural officials to Japan in an attempt to salvage what was once the most lucrative market for U.S. beef.

The delegation, sent at the request of Agriculture Secretary

Mike Johanns, would "assure the Japanese government and public that the U.S. is taking every necessary step to ensure compliance with requirements for exporting beef to Japan," according to a statement by the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo.

But Japanese businesses reacted quickly to the debacle.

Yoshinoya D&C Co., which runs a popular beef-rice restaurant chain, announced Saturday it has postponed plans to reintroduce U.S. beef at its 1,016 eateries, citing "grave problems with U.S. compliance standards."

Major deli chain Rock Field Co., Ltd. said it was pulling all U.S. beef products from its stores until consumer confidence is restored. The chain, based in Kobe, western Japan, had only reintroduced U.S. beef earlier this week, spokesman Masao Takehara said.

"With all this negative publicity, consumers might not trust U.S. beef for a while," even if imports are resumed, he said, adding that the firm will rely for now on Australian beef.

Japan imposed a blanket ban on imports in December 2003 after mad cow disease was detected in an American cow. The ban was lifted Dec. 12, but only for meat from animals aged 20 months or younger, as younger animals are believed unlikely to carry the disease.

The deal also excluded the import of spines, brains, bone marrow and other cattle parts thought to pose a particularly high mad cow risk.

Johanns on Saturday called the contaminated shipment "an unacceptable failure," saying he has ordered unannounced checks at U.S. meat processing plants.

But a national consumer organization called into question the reliability of U.S. facilities.

"Measures taken against (mad cow) in America are still insufficient," the Shodanren said in a statement Saturday, echoing an editorial in the Asahi Shimbun, a national daily newspaper.

"Our fears have come true," the Asahi said in its morning edition. "To regain our trust, the U.S. must fundamentally review its safety standards."

Critics also attacked Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and his government for resuming imports too hastily.

"The government bowed to U.S. pressure and put

President Bush's wishes ahead of the safety of Japanese consumers. I consider that a huge error of judgment," said Yukio Hatoyama, secretary-general of the main opposition, the Democratic Party of Japan, on Saturday.



http://news.yahoo.com/s/cpress/20060121/ca_pr_on_wo/japan_mad_cow_24;_ylt=Am7RKOjpIAfJ_jHLs1nX9Eib.HQA;_ylu=X3oDMTA2ZGZwam4yBHNlYwNmYw--

[mrcheerful]

1. You wanted it you got it Toyota

The next time Japan thinks they will get better treatment from shrub, well what makes them think they deserve more truth then americans? Geeeeeeeeesh, they dumped a lot of cheap dangerous products on the american people, so screw them.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

4. WE are eating this beef, not just Japan

You can't just be glad the Japanese ate a bit of it, when our entire nation has been eating beef normally after being told by the Bush administration that the beef food supply has no mad cow. Now it turns out, it does have mad cow.

[Warren DeMontague]

39. Speak for yourself

I haven't eaten red meat for years. Best fucking health move I ever made.

[FreedomAngel82]

40. Now I'm going to be even more paranoid

I can't even eat meat anymore. :crazy:

[Maru Kitteh]

41. So don't eat it. Not that hard really

Even "safe" cow flesh isn't good for you.

[tiptoe]

45. "You can help by simply running a piece of software." [folding proteins]

:toast:Download to Join the DU Folding@Home team (48157)

-- the GOAL, Nonprofit Research, the Science, FAQ and ”Radar Screen”--

Our goal: to understand protein folding, misfolding, and related diseases

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Links to prior threads:
Original Thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...
Thread #2: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...
Thread #3: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

If you've already joined the team, there's still more you can do. Send out the call to your progressive friends and family; get them to join our team!

C'mon, DUers! More CPUs!!!

January 28, 2004

Scientist urges wider mad-cow tests by Anne C. Mulkern, The Denver Post
WASHINGTON - As the U.S. Department of Agriculture promoted how well it handled the discovery of mad cow disease in Washington state, a top scientist told lawmakers Tuesday that USDA policies are irresponsible and don't protect consumers.

Dr. Stanley B. Prusiner, who won a Nobel Prize in 1997 for his discovery of prions - the infectious agent that causes mad cow disease - said the USDA doesn't really know how many mad-cow cases exist and probably doesn't want to know.

'The problem of prion contamination in the food supply will not disappear,' Prusiner said. 'The sooner we face the problem, a the more easily we shall be able to contain it.'

Prusiner spoke at a forum held by members of the House's Food Safety Caucus, the second congressional hearing of the day on the mad-cow situation.
...
Although some have described the risk of getting variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease...as very low, Prusiner said those statistics are meaningless because we don't know how many mad-cow cases really exist. (see article below, just months later)

Very few cows are tested in the United States, he said, and the disease can take decades to appear. Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is always fatal. It has killed about 150 people in Europe, mostly in Great Britain.
"If you look at human beings as a physician looks at them, it makes no difference what the statistic is," Prusiner said. "If a patient has CJD, they are going to die."

May 21, 2004 (New research from UK may require adjustment of risk)

Thousands more mad cow cases possible By Jon Bonné, MSNBC

While official numbers show human cases of mad cow disease have been tapering off, new research published Friday indicates Britain may be facing thousands of new, previously undetected cases.

Using a mathematical extrapolation, scientists determined that up to 3,800 additional cases may be found in the United Kingdom, where the human form of the fatal brain disease terrified the population and hobbled the beef industry following its discovery in the mid-1980s.

The researchers based their findings on the discovery of potentially infectious proteins in appendix and tonsil tissues removed from 12,674 patients between 1995 and 1999, well after many of the 153 cases of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), the human variant of mad cow, were detected...

[Warren DeMontague]

38. Cheap dangerous Japanese Cars?

Hardly. My corolla kicks ass. I wouldn't buy an American car (do they even MAKE 'cars' anymore? Or just massively outsized pickup trucks for guys with penis size issues?) if you paid me. Everything I've ever bought from Sony has been EXTREMELY well made and reliable. I've been running a VAIO desktop since the summer of 2000-- and I've been waiting for MICROSOFT to release their new version of Windows before I plunk down the money for a new one.

So of what "cheap, dangerous" Japanese products do you speak?

[Name removed]

50. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Warren DeMontague]

You're kidding, right?

Subarus last fucking FOREVER- I had one in college that I drove into the ground, while taking it cross country at least twice a year. I bought a late 80s model Nissan Sentra in the mid 90s that already had over 100K on it, and proceeded to put another 100K on it - with ZERO maintenance issues- before I finally got rid of it. And I still see that exact same model on the road, everywhere. Same with Toyotas.. I think there are far more old-model Nissans, Toyotas and Subarus on the road than there are any other brand of car.

I cannot believe you're honestly trying to claim that Japanese cars aren't well made. No offense, but that's just insane. :crazy: Particularly if stacked up against the shoddy crap Detroit has been peddling since the 1970s.

[jmowreader]

73. Well...mine

The roads of this town are covered with 20-year-old Accords...all seem to be running normally.

[bloom]

81. So they have tighter standards about the beef that they sell/consume?

And you think that's a bad thing?

I think you don't know much about it.

The US would do well to emulate them in beef testing AND car making.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

2. Naturally ocurring herbal extracts will help stem the tide of

neuroinflammation that leads to these types of illnesses. I hope we find them sooner than later.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

3. Pork is looking really good right now.

Does extreme heat (as in boiling in a soup) kill this bacteria, does anyone know?

[renate]

6. nope, cooking doesn't get rid of it

It's not transmitted by bacteria but by prions.
Super scary stuff.

[TomInTib]

8. If you stick to grass-fed beef you have no worries. Never do...

they mention that this is a feedlot problem with cows.

There is so much smoke on this subject that the general public is clueless.
To tell the truth on this would shut down 99% of US meatpacking (beef) business.

Trust me, I know.

When was the last time you heard an industry or FDA spokesman talk about how over 50% of antibiotics consumed in this country are consumed by the beef and pork industry?

Grass-fed is the only way to go.

Commercial beef cows consume over a gallon of petroleum product (oil holds the pellets together) by the time they are slaughtered.

[Lars39]

12. Only if the processer sticks to grass-fed, though.

Machinery can be cross-contaminated.

[TomInTib]

17. Wait until you see what we are putting together on the West Coast

Working ith a major University and a consortiun of ranchers to put together the most unique calve-to-market anywhere, any time.

[Lars39]

18. But will this administration let them test their own beef?

Last I read private testing was a no-no.

[Vanje]

70. Testing is VERY expensive and requires that the animal be dead

Present tests use brain material and arent accurate enough to be practical, require a high degree of training and are frought with false negatives.

A new test on blood is being develpoped that shows promise.

[DenaliDemocrat]

14. Don't eat beef period.

Get outside, learn to hunt and fish. Collect your own meat. It is better tasting, better for you, and you get to experience mother nature and get some exercise at the same time.

[Lars39]

15. Deer get a wasting disease, too.

[DenaliDemocrat]

19. Yep, some do

but you can turn them into to your local fish and game, and for $25, they will tell you if your animal has it. Bush has made it illegal to test beef for JCD even if YOU want to. IN fact, even ranchers who want to raise beef and test them for their own purposes are NOT allowed. YOu see, Bush loves to protect his buddies, especially the ones who don't want to pay for a lab test on a cow.

[RebelOne]

94. Yes, it's chronic wasting disease and it started in the West

with the elk and is slowly spreading through all the U.S.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

34. We take deer

but I just don't care for venison or wild turkey, either. Just too gamey for me.,

[RebelOne]

96. Please explain your statement of "We take deer"

and you don't care for venison. Are you a trophy hunter?

[Nutmegger]

25. This is why I only buy organic beef.

It's damned expensive but worth it.

[Maru Kitteh]

63. Grass fed cows are susceptible to prion (BSE) through the salt blocks

that are left in the fields and shared by common deer and other cervidae plagued nation wide by prion disease known in wild populations as CWD or chronic wasting disease. It is the same disease. The rogue prion is found in reasonably high concentrations in the saliva of infected cervids and bovids. Your grass fed flesh is not safe either.

[Vanje]

68. Not necessarily

Prions can and ARE transmitted from infected female animals to her calves, and to other herd members that have contact with her placental or amniotic substances.

like you say, "Trust me. I know".

I work with an experimental flock of prion-infected sheep. They are all grass fed. And they have transmissible spongiform encephalopathy.

[Maru Kitteh]

69. GOOD LORD. Be careful. That is some scary shit you are doing.

Life taking too long? Maybe you should just take up naked sky-diving into volcanoes or something.

[Vanje]

74. Very careful!

The prion that affects sheep causes a disease called Scrapie. The disease, but not its cause, has been known for centuries is not , apparently , transmissible to humans. Thats why we do research with sheep prions as a model for BSE (mad cow). Scrapie behaves like BSE but is safer to work with.

Still, in all, i'm very careful, and I never never ever would eat any part of my work flock, and I sure as HELL do not want to bring this disease home to my own beautiful (healthy) sheep.

[whatelseisnew]

86. Certified organic has more assurance

than just grass fed. Third party certification is the most reliable method, unless you have the opportunity to know and trust the farmer/rancher first hand.

[AgadorSparticus]

9. no, it doesn't kill it. not even microwaving will kill it.

it's actually not a bacteria. it's a prion which is a protein.

[Dr.Phool]

21. It's not alive in the first place

So, it can't be killed.

[Clark2008]

33. Not to those of us who are allergic to pork

I guess it's seafood and veggie meals.

Can't eat the cow.
Can't eat the chicken.

[AspenRose]

44. I'd watch the seafood too, if I were you

Mercury levels in fish are going up.

And as for fruits and vegetables....two problems: pesticides and GMOs.

Nothing is truly safe anymore. Some choices are better than others, though. It's tough to wade through the research and information but it's worth it to ensure you have the best thing you can have for your dinner.

[Clark2008]

67. True on the seafood, but around here, one can usually

buy local farmers' products for veggies (and I'm doing Atkins, so I'm not eating any fruit right now - btw, I've lost the extra 10 pounds I never got rid of after my 10-pound baby - and I'm only 5'1" WHEW!).

Tonight, we're having shrimp and stir fry (no red veggies, however). My hubby is such a good cook. :)

[kath]

100. Why no red veggies?

[TallahasseeGrannie]

55. Or Jewish or Muslim!

[MoonRiver]

76. And the cow and the chicken thank you!

:toast:

[Vanje]

66. No

The causitive agent in a protein that cant be destroyed by cooking.

[renate]

5. I wish Americans took this as seriously as the Japanese do

It realy makes me sad to think about all the people who blithely trust the government to protect them from this. It's as if they think their health matters more than beef producers' profits.

[AgadorSparticus]

16. I do too. With all the genetic engineering in fruits/veg, the overly

processed foods, and now the contamination in our meat supply, I sometimes wonder if Americans are increasingly being poisoned by what we eat.

[tavalon]

56. Don't wonder

You can be secure in that knowledge!

[OnionPatch]

85. Well, I do

We haven't eaten anything but organic or grass fed beef for years. If you google Mad Cow or go to the Organic Consumer's website, you can see that they are NOT protecting us from Mad Cow disease. At least not to the point where I'm willing to eat the beef or serve it to my family.

[SPKrazy]

7. Spinal Material, not Mad Cow

But if there is spinal material in the beef being sold to fast food restaurants, then it is probably in other places too. Brain and spinal material are the places you are most likely to find evidence of Mad Cow.

[Rosemary2205]

59. Exactly

There's no excuse for selling the spinal or brain matter of cows and until something is done to make sure that doesn't happen then the beef supply isn't safe.

But spinal tissue isn't equal to mad cow.

[pinniped]

10. Doesn't Canada receive our beef and wasn't there a Canadian...

US beef ban around the same time?

If so, they might ban US beef, too.

I don't eat cow, but I sure as hell wouldn't have believed this * asshole when he said it was OK.

All they do is lie and the track record clearly shows it.

Add them to the list of people duped by * and the corporate machine.

--President Asshole's wishes ahead of the safety of Japanese consumers--

[Sinistrous]

11. Your subject line is not supported by these articles.

The articles report that animal parts, specifically spinal cord material, that are "believed to carry a higher risk of mad cow disease", were included in a shipment of beef to Japan.

The articles DO NOT say that the beef was infected.

The scary thing about this incident is that the American meat packer did not take extreme care in preparing this high profile shipment.

Sinistrous

[Karenina]

24. Don't mind me...

However, my take is that had the shipments simply contained banned material that tested NEGATIVE, the Japanese would have politely held their fire. :tinfoilhat:

[havocmom]

13. Your title is somewhat misleading

The problem is that some spinal material turned up, not mad cow disease.

That spinal material might transmit the disease if it the pathogen is present in the steer's nevrous system.

Folks the big problem is corporate processing of cattle. Done cheaply, it can result in parts getting into your food which should not be there.

Mad cow only one of many possible health risks. Fecal matter splattered about when butchering process is hurried is probably an even greater health risk.

Demand better inspections and tighter regulations over the processsing of your food.

[democracyindanger]

29. Not just 'somewhat'.

That title is completely irresponsible.

[havocmom]

62. yep

:thumbsup:

[peacetalksforall]

20. Will someone tell us again why we claim we are superior to every

other country on this planet?

[tavalon]

57. Hubris

But, that was a rhetorical question, wasn't it?

[confuddled]

22. "How many more lies will this administration tell us?"

As many as we allow them to. We have got to get rid of them as soon as possible in any way we can. I begin to question the efficacy of our diligent efforts via the system (contacting our would-be representatives, LTTE's, etc.) and preaching to the choir/squabbling among ourselves here at DU. Think we need to be united and focused in a more aggressive approach if we are to save this moribund democracy.

Am looking at the www.worldcantwait.net/ actions at this point.

[MoonRiver]

23. Once again, I'm so glad I've been a vegetarian for the last 12 years.

GO VEG! :kick:

P.S. Japan must be really stupid to trust this government.

[Jeanette in FL]

48. Me too, 16 years

Every time one of these stories surfaces, I am so grateful that I don't eat meat. I never liked meat as a kid and when I got older hardly ever ate it. I couldn't stand the smell of it.

My son and his family buys a cow from a neighbor who raises them. No antibiotics, no vaccines, no steriods, no growth hormones. They are grass fed and the neighbor does all the butchering for them. I was really surprised one day when I was over their house and they were cooking meat. Did not have that putrid smell that I had remembered. In fact it really looks so different than that stuff that they sell in the supermarket.

[Hyernel]

26. To Bushco, money ALWAYS trumps safety.

I think the biggest risk for getting tainted meat is from fast food.

As long as you get your beef from the grocery store and you just eat the muscle (sirloin, chuck, round, etc...) you'll be okay, I think.

But the places that ground up every part of the cow, treat it with chemicals and flavors and shape it into a patty...that's where the danger is. (I'd avoid all beef sausages too....stick with piggy. OINK!)

[spanone]

27. The way Bush* lies to his own people, one can only imagine how he lies

to those overseas whom I'm sure he disdains.

[area51]

28. "How many more lies will this administration tell us?"

A: How long is forever? :mad:

[Sarah Ibarruri]

30. We're so desperate to believe beef isn't tained 'cause they said so

This administration has lied about everything else. The FDA is under the instructions of this administration to do their bidding. Nothing the FDA says can be taken as truth as long as it's under this administration. At some point after the mad cow hysteria, the FDA ceased testing for mad cow, and stated that U.S. beef was fine and healthy for consumption. The FDA leaves it up to the hands of the people who would stand to lose profits by having to not sell their beef: cattle owners. Not long ago there was an article written by someone who worked for the cattle industry saying they were not testing cattle that fell down (one of the signs that there's full-fledged mad cow). Then all articles about mad cow disappeared magically, and the virus seemed to just die, so we all went out and bought meat and said, "Awww, it was only spinal material to begin with anyway. I'm gonna have me a big steak."

I never believed it. And now this. We Americans are still desperate to believe that this administration is not really lyingand would not do us harm for profit, or that mad cow disappeared from our food supply, or that somehow, magically, no mad cow ever will enter their mouth because, hey, they long to believe it's in spinal material only, and spinal material is something that is somehow not part of the rest of the cow, either in life or in the butcher shop. Americans whose businesses depend on beef, fight the idea that mad cow has been found in U.S. beef.

My brother(who lives in Spain) is amazed at how much Americans will put up with. Spaniards will protest over much less. Well, Japanese aren't eating it. Neither are Europeans. We are, though.

[Fountain79]

31. I'm curious...

How many people have died from Mad Cow?

[Sarah Ibarruri]

36. From moment of infection to symptoms, it's a decade or so nt

[tiptoe]

43. "Incubation of human disease could extend for decades" (new findings)

See May 21, 2004 article in post #45 above: "You can help by simply running a piece of software."

[SoCalDem]

51. and symptoms could coincidentally occur in elderly

beef-eaters and be mistaken for alzheimers?? I bet there are a lot of poor elderly who have "alzheimers" that might not BE alzheimers. Pre industrial beef production probably was a lot safer, but the beef these folks started eating as they approached their 50's could be starting to affect them NOW, as they are aging..

People younger, could be still incubating the disease.. Apparently there's no definitive test except for an autopsy..

[tiptoe]

53. Could Mad Cow Disease Already be Killing Thousands of Americans Every Year

Could Mad Cow Disease Already be Killing Thousands of Americans Every Year? by Michael Greger, M.D.
Published on Wednesday, January 7, 2004 by CommonDreams.org

...Over the last 20 years the rates of Alzheimer's disease in the United States have skyrocketed.<60>According to the CDC, Alzheimer's Disease is now the eighth leading cause of death in the United States,<61> afflicting an estimated 4 million Americans.<62> Twenty percent or more of people clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, though, are found at autopsy not to have had Alzheimer's at all.<63> A number of autopsy studies have shown that a few percent of Alzheimer's deaths may in fact be CJD. Given the new research showing that infected beef may be responsible for some sporadic CJD, thousands of Americans may already be dying because of Mad Cow disease every year.<64>

Nobel Laureate Gajdusek, for example, estimates that 1% of people showing up in Alzheimer clinics actually have CJD.<65> At Yale, out of a series of 46 patients clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's, six were proven to have CJD at autopsy.<66> In another study of brain biopsies, out of a dozen patients diagnosed with Alzheimer's according to established criteria, three of them were actually dying from CJD.<67> An informal survey of neuropathologists registered a suspicion that CJD accounts for 2-12% of all dementias in general.<68> Two autopsy studies showed a CJD rate among dementia deaths of about 3%.<69,70> A third study, at the University of Pennsylvania, showed that 5% of patients diagnosed with dementia had CJD.<71> Although only a few hundred cases of sporadic CJD are officially reported in the U.S. annually,<72> hundreds of thousands of Americans die with dementia every year.<73> Thousands of these deaths may actually be from CJD caused by eating infected meat.

The incubation period for human spongiform encephalopathies such as CJD can be decades.<74> This means it can be years between eating infected meat and getting diagnosed with the death sentence of CJD. Although only about 150 people have so far been diagnosed with variant CJD worldwide, it will be many years before the final death toll is known. In the United States, an unknown number of animals are infected with Mad Cow disease, causing an unknown number of human deaths from CJD. The U.S. should immediately begin testing all cows destined for human consumption, as is done in Japan, should stop feeding slaughterhouse waste to all farm animals (see http://organicconsumers.org/madcow/GregerBSE.cfm), and should immediately enact an active national surveillance program for CJD.<75>
...

(article published before UK studies of May, 2004)

[tavalon]

58. That's the thing

We don't know. We do know that degenerative neurological diseases such as "Alzheimer's" are increasing a lot. And that maybe some of those are "something else". Is it a form of mad cow? Who knows. You can't tell if you don't look and that seems to be the modus operandi here.

[Maru Kitteh]

64. onset of the disease is directly proportional to the life expectancy of

the infected animal, in the human animal that may be from 10 to 30 years. Do you wonder why people are showing signs of Alzheimer's disease at younger and younger ages? CJD.

[elehhhhna]

32. Condi will suggest we Bomb Japan! They insulted American cows!

[Sarah Ibarruri]

35. from infection to symptoms it's years - and govt not protecting us

Researchers and companies say the govt. is not protecting U.S. against mad cow:
http://www.boston.com/yourlife/health/diseases/articles/2006/01/04/group_us_not_protected_against_mad_cow/



USDA refused to release its own records re mad cow:

http://www.upi.com/inc/view.php?StoryID=20031223-103657-3424r

[tiptoe]

37. .

dupe --> post #45 "You can help by simply running a piece of software." [folding proteins

[Warren DeMontague]

42. How many cases of mad cow disease have been traced back to tofu?

Just wondering.

[KeepItReal]

46. Note to self: Eat Mor Chikin....

This post paid for by Chick-fil-A

[seabeyond]

47. u.s. bf has mad cow???? i dont see any evidence from article

that states or implies, or is even suggesting that the u.s. bf has mad cow. what an outrageous title compared to what the actual article said. or what you had. i didnt go into any link. does it state anywhere u.s. cattle has mad cow disease?

[RC]

49. How are we supposed to know how much, if any Mad Cow is in this country

if most cows are not tested?

Even those people that want to test at their own expense are stopped by this government. Now why is that?

Mad Cow is easily preventable. Don't feed animal protein to cows. It is that simple. This has been known for over 15 years.

And yet Mad Cow is still a worrying menace in our food supply. Why is that?

[seabeyond]

52. i read the article because i have suspicions myself.

i am eating the stuff, but even more important to me, i am feeding my kids it. i have been getting hamburger at the store that makes me ask, what is it? that always bothers me. looks like hamburger, but doesn't act like hamburger. i am very much interested in keeping our food supply safe. i dont trust our govt. i want our stuff checked and i want to make sure there is nothing wrong with our beef, chicken, veggies that have pesticide and mutated. i have gotten bananas that look and taste like banana's but they dont act like a banana that makes me question what it is

i dont trust bush to take care of us either

still, the title was false. i dont like any lying. not even for the greater good. especially for the greater good. so damn sick and tired of lying for the greater good

my sons p.e. teacher told him dont wear a seatbelt you die.

well, not even close to be a truth. but lie, in fear for the greater good.

putting out classes for our kids to protect themselves from terrorists? more fear for our kids, i am sure in lie, for greater good

have sex will die.... lie for the greater good

there was another one on the board a couple days ago i cant remember, advocating lying for the greater good.

in all these things, there is enough of a lesson to teach our children in truth, we dont have to resort to lie and fear to get them to do right.

[Maru Kitteh]

65. every single package of supermarket ground beef contains feces

For Gods sake don't feed shit to your kids. Ground beef is partially obtained by scraping the carcass (particularly the less desirable portions such as the face and neck bones) with little rubber scrapers in a machine thats kind of like the most gruesome car wash in hell. The bits of flesh and tissue are collected from these scrapers and dumped into a giant vat where it is mixed with other "recovered" flesh. One package of ground beef contains bits of tissue from hundreds, and sometimes as many as a thousand or more animals. You want to increase your chances of BSE, e-coli, campylobacter, etc... just eat some ground beef.

[uppityperson]

54. Spinal material, not mad cow.

[newyawker99]

60. Sarah Ibarruri

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
copyrighted news source
and provide links to
the sources.


Thank you.


NYer99
DU Moderator

[Yollam]

61. That is not what the story says.

The story said that the beef contained spinal material, which it should not have. That does not mean that it had mad cow.

The US should have kept up its part of the deal & not included the spinal material. But the material, though it may carry a higher risk of having BSE has not been shown to have it.


Yoshinoya, by the way, continues to carry beef bowl gyudon at it's stores in California, and has never suspended it during the last three years, "despite its "grave concerns".


There are two side of this 1. A Bush-run USDA cannot be trusted, and the Japanese probably know this. 2. Japanese have had a long historical tendency to distrust imports and towards protectionism.

I hope that the US can get its act together and come to the realization that any beef we expect to export to Japan should be able to pass a higher standard than exports to other countries. That's just the way it is.

[Karenina]

71. I wish you guys would get it.

If they can lie and obfuscate their way into feeding ANYONE AND EVERYONE poisonous, diseased crap and make a porfit on it, THEY WILL DO IT!

Simply ask yourself why a cattle producer that wants to export to Japan is FORBIDDEN to test it's meat at it's own expense. :freak:

[Yollam]

78. All of that may be true, but the headline should be accurate.

We should hold ourselves up to the highest standards of accuracy possible. We are not the wingnut right.

The fact is that there was probably no BSE in that shipment, saying so could damage our credibility.

The US was on the wrong side of this argument, however, and the Japanese side were well within their rights to suspend shipments again. Apparently, we've got a lot to learn about keeping deals made in good faith.

[Karenina]

88. Bear with me a moment, Yollam

as I weigh this on my Libra scale and please do woik wit me hyeh...

On one hand, you are correct. "We should hold ourselves up to the highest standards of accuracy possible."

On the OTHER HAND, ANY standard of accuracy should include safeguards which are sorely lacking in the good ol' US of A. Cattle ranchers feed their herds SHIT. This is well documented. The medical community has been screaming for DECADES about hormones, antibiotics and their consequences. Downed cattle are processed into the food chain DAILY. The SIMPLE SOLUTION is to test every animal as Japan does.
Even independent tests are FORBIDDEN by your gub'mint. One MUST ask WHY???

Americans have been conditioned to respond to BOOGA BOOGA. If the OP's subject line promts people to pose questions that should have been posed YEARS AGO, somehow I have no problem with that. Then again I have my :tinfoilhat: theory that if the meat were clean, the Japanese would have let it pass...

[salin]

89. Bingo - and small meat packing companies

who wanted to test all beef - and use that "approval" as a marketing technique (as a niche product) were prevented by the USDA from doing so. Why? Big producers/packers didn't want the public desiring that they, too, followed suit. So to protect the BIG companies against potential costs - the GOVT used its regulatory power to PREVENT small companies from competing with BIG companies using "all meat tested" as a competitive advantage.

Er - isn't that the free market way? Isn't that why we are told that what is good for the "free market" is good for consumers? Isn't that why we were told that "regulatory agencies" shouldn't regulate - that it hampers competition and "market forces"?

This forgotten story (about several small companies being PREVENTED by the USDA from testing all of their beef) - is one more piece of evidence that the current admin is NOT a friend to "free markets" it is a friend to Big Corporations and likes to use govt as a form of maintaining a non-competitive market place that favors corporate giants at the expense of consumers.

[Rex]

72. It won't stop until someone stops it.

They neutered the EPA and now wreck havoc on our country...cry havoc and let loose the dogs of war! How far can we slide on this self-destruction spiral?

[earth mom]

75. I stopped eating beef over a year ago....

I don't trust Bush Co, the FDA, the Ranchers-any of em! ALL Bush Co cares about is profits over people! And they've proved it to us over and over and over again!

[Lorien]

91. Ten years ago for me; not just the mad cow worries me

The American beef industry is also responsible for rapid deforestation in South America, as our insatiable desire for cattle land and cattle feed keeps increasing. America's enormous love of beef is squeezing out both indigenous species and people all over the world. It simply isn't worth it.

[earth mom]

93. Wish I had known 10 years ago...or had been paying attention!

You are smart! :)

[Lorien]

95. Actually, it was Oprah's 1996 show about mad cow that stopped

me cold from ever eating beef again. It must have done the same for a lot of of other people too, otherwise the Beef Council probably wouldn't have sued her! However, the Adkins diet made up for any shortfalls from that program...

An Utne reader article enlightened me about the human and environmental toll of beef. Great magazine, highly recommended. :thumbsup:

[earth mom]

97. I don't know why I wasn't paying attention back then...

I knew about the Oprah show and court case. I guess I thought that there were strong protections in place by the FDA and that the health and safety of the people came first...HA! Talk about naive!

And I will check out that magazine...Thanks! :hi:

[leesa]

77. Well, of course the US has mad cow disease. Why do you think the FDA

refuses to test?

[drfresh]

79. If the Bush administration prevents me from eating my hamburgers...

I'm gonna be one pissed off MOFO. Why couldn't it be Mad Deer disease or something.

[womanofthehills]

80. Buying meat from ranchers

My neighbors & I chipped in to buy a grass fed cow from a rancher out here in rural NM. I had pretty much stopped eating beef but this is pretty clean beef. I only eat organic but worry about my grandkids who still occasionally eat fast junk food. This year I'm going to increase my garden. Right now, I'm growing greens & tomatoes in my windows.

I heard a lot of range beef is grain finished so that's why we chipped in to get this total grass fed cow which happens to be some of the best beef I ever tasted.

[SoCalDem]

82. When we lived in Belen, we bought a hindquarter from a rancher too

and he even threw in homemade sausage (the best we have ever had) and real bacon..

It was the best meat ...and cut the way WE liked it, and in the sizes WE wanted..

[Breeze54]

83. The article's DID NOT say they FOUND Mad Cow Disease!

:wtf:
It said it found "some spinal cord tissue"
which is known to carry the disease...

http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=69382&version=1&template_id=45&parent_id=25
Japan bans US beef over mad cow fears
Published:
Saturday, 21 January, 2006, 09:56 AM Doha Time
TOKYO/WASHINGTON:
Japan yesterday halted imports of US beef
just a month after lifting a ban,
following the discovery of spinal material
in a shipment that should have been removed
due to the risk of mad cow disease.
US officials immediately launched an investigation
and ordered extra training for all American meat
inspectors,
surprise inspections at plants handling beef exports,
and sent a team of experts to examine meat shipments
now held in Japanese ports.
~~~~~~~~~
I'm no bush lover by any means and I don't want to eat spinal cord!
Gross!
But I also don't like being misled...

:spank:

[Horse with no Name]

84. Mike Johanns (crony) seeks to ignore mad cow disease and weaken testing

http://www.generationgreen.org/actionalert_07-2005.htm
The government has been very careful to try to reassure the U.S. public—as well as overseas consumers of U.S.-raised cattle—that mad cow disease isn’t in this country, and that the one known case discovered in January 2004 is the only case. Now come revelations that suggest the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) let a bovine with mad cow disease slip through the regulatory net recently—and that the USDA may even have tried to cover up this fact.

"After a great deal of public and media pressure surrounding rumors of a cover-up, the agriculture department confirmed in June that a cow that died last year was infected with mad cow disease," notes Rochelle Davis, Executive Director of Generation Green. "It knew for seven months and kept the public in the dark about it, which puts all of our families at risk."

According to coverage in the New York Times, all that was known until June was that an earlier test on the same cow in November 2004 had come up negative. The negative result was obtained using a test that the Agriculture Department refers to as its "gold standard." Shortly thereafter, an "experimental" test was performed at the same laboratory on the same cow, and that test came up positive.

Now, Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns is complaining that Fong overstepped her authority. Yet Fong is the kind of person we need in the USDA, not the kind of person who should be criticized. After embarking on a criminal investigation of the first case of mad cow disease in the United States, Fong concluded that there was no criminal negligence, but in July she released an audit of the USDA’s testing program and concluded it had serious flaws that could undermine its credibility and lead to questionable estimates of how widespread mad cow disease is in America.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

87. Interesting

http://www.harpers.org/MadCowDisease.html


Here's an interesting table compiled by Harper's.

If the USDA and FDA were actively testing the entire meat industry's product, rather than leaving it to the cattle industry (which is only interested in profits and is like the foxes in the hen house with respect to our health), and began being honest, I think this table would look terrifying.

[RebelOne]

90. All I can say is that I'm a vegetarian, so at least I don't have

to worry about mad cow disease or chronic wasting disease from deer.

[cascadiance]

92. The problem is that U.S. and Canadian laws on Madcow are too simplistic...

The Europeans learned the hard way, and have more strict laws. Japan has paid attention to their experience and enacted similarly strict laws. We in the northern hemisphere of the Americas, have not!

Though we restrict cattle parts from being reintroduced back into the feed of cattle that is supposed to stop the transmission of prions in the most volatile sense, we don't restrict poultry and pork parts from being used in cattle feed, nor cattle parts in poultry and pork feeds, which allows the disease to be carried still. Though poultry and hogs don't have mad cow like cattle do, they HAVE been shown to be carriers of it. Therefore by allowing these loose feed restrictions, which no longer are allowed in Europe or in Japan, Canada and U.S. are allowing this to persist.

Now granted, the U.S. policies won't allow mad cow disease to be spread in as volatile fashion as older policies allowed Europe to get infected, it is perhaps more insidious that they still allow this disease to fester the way they are now, as this is a long time incubation disease, and we might suddenly discover many years from now that this "festering" spread of this disease will be quite pronounced then.

Canadian government researchers were fired for alerting their government to this lack of restrictions being inadequate. I hope that at some point we get wiser about this, and not take the lack of "apparent" symptoms of this disease for granted!

[tiptoe]

98. kick

[Ksec]

99. First Ive heard of this..

I guess that was the plan. Let us poison ourselves so a few rich folks can keep their profits rolling in.

Unbelievable whats become of this country under the GOP fascists.