Why is it the Japanese get it and the USDA doesn’t?
American Beef isn’t tested for Mad Cow. Japanese beef is–100%. Whether the disease is present or not, doesn’t it make sense to verify that it isn’t by testing more than 1% of cattle? Now even though Japanese beef is more expensive to consumers than untested US beef, the Japanese are only buying their own, locally raised meats. Sounds good to me. Everyone wins–the Japanese farmers get to raise and sell more beef and the consumers get a product from a local source they can trust. Hurrah!
So why then won’t the USDA allow companies to privately test their beef? Why won’t they test more beef themselves? Instead they use Mad Cow as an excuse to try to ram through National Animal ID–a system which is more costly on the whole than just testing every slaughtered animal for the damn disease. They may be good at spending money, but no one said they were smart, or served the consumer’s best interest.
Now in another brilliant stroke Homeland (in)Security is blathering on about agriterrorism and how Mad Cow (BSE) and Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) could be used as terrorist weapons to destroy our food supply. Well, thank you very much–why not hand out written invitations and vials of the toxins to any would-be terrorist cell within range? In fact, why not gather all our nations food supplies into central zones and destroy America’s ability to produce its own food–Oh, wait! Centralization has already been happening!
The USDA and NAIS are already destroying the potential for diversity and small farming. Who are the real terrorists–the foreign foes who would look out of place on a 10,000 acre ranch trying to polute the waters, or a Government agent so pissed off his bonus isn’t coming because his agenda isn’t being met?
So to beat a dead cow a bit more. . . .First off, how could these would-be terrorists get BSE? Most scientists working on the issue for years haven’t been able to identify much about the mysterious prions which cause it, let alone know how it works. And even if a terrorist fed ground up cow spine from a known infected animal to a herd of cattle, how could they be sure it would work, and how long would it take? And how widespread the destruction? Sure, lots of panic perhaps. But if the USDA would begin testing every beef animal slaughtered for BSE, then there wouldn’t be much a hope that this plan would work.
So let’s tackle FMD–the "dread" disease. One fact source states:
Is FMD harmful to the animals?
While FMD does not pose a health risk to humans, it can be fatal for young cattle, sheep and hogs by causing inflammation of the heart muscle.
The disease is generally not fatal in older animals. Cattle, sheep and pigs infected with FMD develop a fever followed by blisters around the mouth and feet but they can recover.
Infection drastically reduces milk production in cattle. Infected animals also become weak and prone to other illnesses.
Why is it necessary to carry out mass slaughtering of animals in FMD infected areas?
FMD is the most infectious animal disease known and there is no cure for it. Unless the disease is stopped quickly, it can spread rapidly through an entire region. This affects productivity and a country’s ability to export so the disease has profound impact on a country’s economy and agricultural sector. While vaccination is used in many countries to control the disease, in an outbreak such as has occurred in the UK, vaccination is infective in stopping the spread of the disease. The only way to deal with an outbreak is to slaughter animals at sites of infection.
So if it is not fatal to the animals, except perhaps the young–why not test for it? Doesn’t the mass slaughter of countless, suspected, but not proven, diseased animals affect "productivity and a country’s ability to export"? I mean if all the cattle are dead and burnt up from extermination than they certainly can’t be exported, can they? Wouldn’t it be better and cheaper for the industry to allow the cattle to weather the virus and recover to be productive another day, than to wipe everything out and start again? Wouldn’t an immunity build against the disease which doesn’t happen if everything must start afresh each time?
Now I am not a veteranarian–although I did study to be one–so, I do play one on the interent. It seems to me that knee-jerk reactions and industry pressure are what lead to mass-inihillation of animals in an agriterrorist or disease outbreak scenario. Why not beat the terrorists by testing and using common sense? Remove the efficacy of the target and there is no target.
At an Animal ID meeting recently, as if on script, when pressure was applied to a State Veterianarian he trooped out the "threat" of FMD. When I said it wasn’t fatal, he began to use the words "100% morbidity rate"–which on the surface can be confused with "mortality" but really mean it is highly infectious. When I called him on that he claimed I should ask the people undergoing an FMD outbreak right now North of us what they thought. So I tried. But the Vet lied. There hasn’t been an outbreak of FMD in the area anytime in the last 100 years.
During the meeting when further pressure was applied to the Vet on animal ID, out came the script. "What if a terrorist went into a livestock aution and dropped this (he held up a pen)–a vial of FMD. . .This is why we need Animal ID. . ." No. Animal ID won’t prevent terrorism, or disease outbreaks. Proper testing and better control of the money the USDA spends will.
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