NEWS ROUNDUP
Forest Service decision on grasslands expected soon The U.S. Forest Service is expected to issue a decision soon regarding 16 appeals against its Northern Great Plains Management Plans Revision, a document involving the management of national grasslands in Wyoming, the Dakotas and Montana. The plan revision was finalized in July 2002, capping seven years of development. Five of the appeals involve grazing and mineral development in northeast Wyoming's Thunder Basin National Grassland... Contractor quits horse roundup in Carson National Forest A contractor hired to round up wild horses in the Carson National Forest has thrown in the towel. New Mexico Horse Project director Carlos LoPopolo failed to capture a single horse in the Jarita Mesa Wild Horse Territory. He blames stormy weather and the flu, which struck many of his crewmembers and halted work for 13 days. A U.S. Forest Service contract gave LoPopolo's group 30 days to round up the horses, beginning December First...Conservation group buys Sage Creek land The Conservation Fund has purchased 160 acres of land along Sage Creek in the Pryor Mountains, with plans to close the deal on an adjoining 160 acre tract in March. The purchase is part of a plan to buy six 160-acre tracts belonging to the Schwend families. The Conservation Fund will then sell the land to the Custer National Forest. Money for the purchase came from a $750,000 appropriation in the Interior budget. Gates Watson, the Montana representative of the nonprofit Conservation Fund, said his group is in the process of drawing up plans to request money from the 2005 budget for the four other tracts...Alaska Wildlife Experts Use Floating Lab In service for 16 years, the Tiglax has emerged as a major player in managing the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, which extends from the state's southeastern arm to the Aleutian Islands to the Arctic Slope. It's a floating science center with access to many of the 2,500 islands, islets and headlands that make up the 3.5 million-acre refuge. Researchers from federal agencies, universities and other institutions use the 120-foot vessel for hundreds of projects, keeping track of the health and welfare of the Far North's abundant marine life. Most of the research is done along the Aleutians and Gulf of Alaska during the warmer months, when lush grasses sprout waist-high and the region comes alive with millions of returning seabirds, whales, otters and sea lions...Some say mouse is hurting business A study suggesting that Preble's meadow jumping mouse may not need protection under the Endangered Species Act comes too late for some developers and landowners. Developer Al Alba said his company, Omnivest Realty, lost more than $1 million as a result of mouse habitat protection that caused an 18-month delay on a Colorado site where he plans to build affordable housing. A recent Denver Museum of Nature and Science study called the mouse's protected status into question, suggesting it's not a genetically distinct subspecies worthy of protection under the Endangered Species Act. "I didn't know whether to cheer or cry when I heard about the museum study," Alba said. "In any case, it came too late to have any bearing on our project. We just had to bite the bullet, take the loss and move on." The study was released on the same day that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that there was insufficient evidence to support three separate petitions to remove the mouse's protected status...Supporters champion stronger ESA Supporters of the Endangered Species Act say the law has been the difference between existence and extinction of many plants and animals, but that more needs to be done to ensure permanent recovery of imperiled species. Calls for increased commitment to the act comes on its 30th anniversary --- celebrated Dec. 28 --- as the Bush administration is considering moves to make significant changes to the law... Costs of ESA provoke ranchers' wrath Livestock producers in Wyoming say the Endangered Species Act has appropriately helped a couple of species survive, but for the most part, they feel, the act is a land use tool that hurts ranchers. Asked to look back on the 30-year history of the Endangered Species Act, Wyoming Stock Growers Association executive vice-president Jim Magagna said the ESA is not working the way it was intended. The act is having huge, negative impacts on the state's livestock producers, he said... Editorial: Common enemies Utah ranchers today are fearing that a decision expected early this week from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will move a once-common bird called the greater sage grouse toward the protections of the Endangered Species Act. If the government does start the process toward protecting the ground-dwelling bird, whose numbers have dropped dramatically over the last 20 years, ranchers fear their ability to graze their herds on public lands will be subjected to more restrictions. But public lands are in need of more restrictions, and would be even if there were no such beast as the greater sage grouse. Ranching throughout the West, already heavily subsidized with cheap grazing permits, is threatened by basically the same factors that have pushed the grouse and its cousins to the brink of extinction -- drought, urban sprawl and overly aggressive oil and gas exploration being the most prominent...Feds delay new elementary school A possible threat to the habitat of two endangered species means that some students may be starting school in a portable classroom rather than a brand-new campus this fall, a school official said Monday. Lake Elsinore Unified School District has put on hold its plans for building the new Ronald Reagan Elementary School off Baxter Road while it works out with federal agencies the potential impacts of the project on the species and takes appropriate action to protect their habitat, district officials said Monday. In July, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers identified the 13-acre parcel as a possible habitat area for the Quino checkerspot butterfly and the coastal California gnatcatcher, a U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service official said Monday. Both species are listed by the federal government as being endangered...Appeals Court Favors State Over Minnow New Mexico and other Western states have won another victory over the silvery minnow. The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals has set aside an earlier decision that allowed the federal government to take water from states or cities to protect an endangered species. State Attorney General Patricia Madrid said the court's ruling applies not just to the silvery minnow, but also to all similar cases. "I think it's a victory for state's rights to say the federal government cannot tell New Mexico how to use its precious and scarce water resources," Madrid said...Snowmobile case surfaces in new court In the latest twist over snowmobiling in Yellowstone National Park, a federal judge in Wyoming has agreed to revive a court case that challenged a ban on the machines that was issued near the end of the Clinton administration. U.S. District Judge Clarence Brimmer said on Dec. 31 that he would reopen the case but did not set a schedule for when it would proceed. Attorneys on both sides of the snowmobile fight were notified of the decision Monday. The decision could mean that the dispute over snowmobiles moves into two federal courts...Coalbed methane: The lawsuits As drilling for coalbed methane slowly picks up in southeastern Montana, legal battles over development of the natural gas continue to pit conservationists, American Indians and landowners against government agencies and developers. At latest count, there are four cases pending in U.S. District Court in Billings, another case from the district on appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and one suit pending in Montana District Court. Most of the lawsuits challenge two environmental studies approved earlier this year by Montana and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management in Montana and Wyoming. Conservation groups, landowners and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe all sued the BLM and U.S. Department of Interior shortly after BLM approved plans in Montana and Wyoming for coalbed methane development. The suits allege the environmental analyses were inadequate and violated federal laws...Conservationists, tribes urge caution in coalbed methane development Conservation groups in 2003 won key rulings on issues of tapping coalbed methane in Montana, and they aren't relaxing their efforts. The Northern Plains Resource Council, a Billings-based non-profit group representing conservationists and family agriculture, has filed at least six lawsuits over coalbed methane. Five are pending and a sixth was settled in NPRC's favor. The Northern Cheyenne Tribe has joined one of the suits against the Bureau of Land Management, saying it fears development plans threaten tribal ways of life. Developers have accused the conservation group of being obstructionist and anti-industry. The group says it only aims to ensure that coalbed methane development doesn't deplete or degrade water resources, or drive farmers and ranchers out of business...Ready, set, Montana takes measured approach to coalbed exploration The year 2003 was a turning point for coalbed methane development in Montana. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management and state of Montana completed a long-awaited environmental study that will guide development of an estimated 26,000 wells in the state in the next 20 years. In March, the Montana Board of Environmental Review adopted numeric water quality standards for salts in groundwater discharged by coalbed methane wells. The standards apply to the Powder, Little Powder and Tongue rivers and Rosebud Creek in southeastern Montana. The numeric standards are to protect the rivers' water quality while allowing developers to discharge some of the huge quantities of groundwater that are brought to the surface to release the natural gas. The wrangling over the numeric standards between landowners, who worried about protecting their soils and crops, and developers, who were concerned that too stringent standards could stymie methane production, ended with standards that both sides said they could live with...Editorial: A cow eating grass You remember the story of the clever art student, the one who framed a blank canvass and titled it "Cow Eating Grass." Where was the grass? The cow ate it all. Where was the cow? Why would she stick around if there was no grass? At the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, that's not a joke. It's a mission statement. In another of those carefully timed announcements (Friday afternoon, when all the bigfoot Washington reporters are off to their weekend houses in Virginia), the BLM released an analysis of its own proposed new rules for grazing rights on the millions of acres it supposedly holds in the name of all of the American people. The agency's own analysis declares that the agency's proposed rules are just wonderful, except for "some short-term adverse effects" that will result from an approach that is even more see-no-evil than the existing one...Helping Mother Nature: Nonprofit group works to protect desert tortoises from too much -- and too little -- human interaction Betty Burge of Las Vegas can't think of an animal more endearing than the desert tortoise. "There's hardly an animal that you can walk up to in the wild, that's this big that's nonthreatening. Even children like them," says Burge, 71, who has largely devoted the past 31 years to studying and protecting the gentle reptile. Aside from inexorable loss of habitat as city replaces desert, the tortoise's placid approachability also places it at risk, notes Burge, who helped found the nonprofit Tortoise Group. Since 1982 it has been advising people on the proper care, feeding and habitat for pet tortoises...Big chill triggers jump in U.S. natural gas U.S. natural gas prices made big gains Monday on the first trading day of the year, propelled by cold weather and persistent market concerns about the nation's ability to meet demand as its gas supplies lag. A 10-percent jump in U.S. gas futures prices Monday fits a volatile pattern seen in recent months that most energy analysts blame on the market's inability to find equilibrium...Wyden deftly walks political line Sen. Ron Wyden helped Republicans turn controversial legislation regarding public lands and Medicare drug benefits into law in 2003. But the Portland Democrat appears to be riding out the anger from some of his urban, liberal supporters -- people who opposed the Healthy Forests Restoration Act as a backdoor effort to boost logging on public lands and the Medicare prescription drug bill as the first step toward privatizing the federal program. Oregon political experts say that Wyden's actions reflect the savvy calculations of a man skilled in navigating the state's political waters...Smith branches out by writing text for Fielder's forest book Colorado landscape photographer John Fielder and Glenwood Springs resident Steve Smith have paddled rivers and promoted environmental protection together. Now they have teamed up on Fielder's latest book, released late in 2003. Smith, a consultant to environmental organizations, has penned a 10,000-word essay accompanying the photos in "Seeing Colorado's Forests for the Trees." Smith's text covers the gamut: the different types of trees found at different elevations in Colorado; the history of man's use and enjoyment of forests; the impacts of fires, and infestations of insects and weeds; and the conservation ethic that has arisen side by side with logging, road development and other human incursions into the backcountry... Bush Makes Time for 'Hook and Bullet' Set The National Rifle Assn. was represented at the White House meeting; so were Ducks Unlimited and Pheasants Forever. Altogether, President Bush spent more than an hour with the leaders of some 20 hunting and fishing groups in the room named for Theodore Roosevelt, the first conservationist president. The unusually lengthy meeting -- followed by a major decision in its favor -- shows the "hook and bullet" crowd, as the anglers and hunters call themselves, to be a powerful new force on environmental issues in Washington. Traditional environmental groups, which have been hostile to the president from the start, have had a hard time catching the administration's ear. The hunters and anglers are more effective with the Bush administration, some of their leaders said, because they represent millions of Americans, many of whom vote Republican, and because they reject the confrontational strategy of the environmental movement...3 Top Enforcement Officials Say They Will Leave E.P.A. Three top enforcement officials at the Environmental Protection Agency have resigned or retired in the last two weeks, including two lawyers who were architects of the agency's litigation strategy against coal-burning power plants. The timing of the departures and comments by at least one of the officials who is leaving suggest that some have left out of frustration with the Bush administration's policy toward enforcement of the Clean Air Act. "The rug was pulled out from under us," said Rich Biondi, who is retiring as associate director of the air enforcement division of the agency. "You look around and say, `What contribution can I continue to make here?' and it was limited." Cynthia Bergman, a spokeswoman for the agency, said of the departures, "This is an office of several hundred employees -- and to have one political appointee and two career employees leave is not indicative of unrest or departmentwide frustration."...Column: Politics in the lab hits US scientific integrity In theory, science is supposed to be cold, analytical, dispassionate - and studiously apolitical. But in the real world of competing demands for federal research dollars, savvy scientists of all disciplines - from cognitive psychologists running rats through mazes to nuclear physicists operating massive particle accelerators - recognize that a certain amount of political meddling in their research by policymakers in the executive branch and Congress is to be expected. However, there are limits - limits the Bush administration has frequently disregarded by imposing stringent political controls on a broad variety of federal scientific programs and activities. This has raised acute concern in the American scientific community that the administration's drive to stamp its conservative values on science isn't just affecting policy decisions, but undermining the integrity of the US research infrastructure itself...Ozone standards pose health risk, scientists report The air Americans breathe contains more ozone from pollution than the Environmental Protection Agency estimates, Harvard scientists report. Ozone can cause pain, breathing difficulties, and coughing. It can damage the lungs, EPA warns on its Web site, and it can also make one susceptible to respiratory infections. Those active outdoors are particularly at risk for exposure, the agency says. To calculate air quality standards for ozone, EPA distinguishes between the background or "natural" levels of ozone in the air and that caused by pollution in North America. "Our results actually indicate that EPA is overestimating the background level, and as a result is underestimating the health risk associated with ozone pollution," atmospheric chemist Arlene Fiore says. This assumption skews the air quality standards that EPA sets, making them weaker than they could be, Fiore and co-authors report in the Journal of Geophysical Research - Atmospheres, published by the American Geophysical Union...Pollution database lists 300 spills over 5 years On Nov. 11, 1998, an equipment malfunction caused the Montana Sulphur and Chemical Co. plant in Billings to release nearly 14 tons of sulfur dioxide into the air during a 2 1/2-hour period. Near Cut Bank on March 10, 2002, vandals turned loose railroad cars that derailed into a building containing batteries and caused abouts six gallons of acid to leak into the ground. Those were two of more than 300 suspected or actual unauthorized spills, discharges and releases of pollution in Montana reported over the past five years to a national clearinghouse maintained by the federal government. An Associated Press review of the National Response Center's database shows a wide variety in the types of spills and releases reported - from seemingly insignificant releases of hair spray to tens of thousands of gallons of ethanol. In about six of every 10 incidents, the chemical or substance reached a body of water, usually a nearby river or stream, the analysis found...Water Sentinels Go 'Knee-Deep' Kruzen is one of eight regional staffers in the Water Sentinels program. Now in its second year, the program educates the public about local water-quality problems and the lack of environmental law enforcement. Sierra Club chapters recruit, train, and equip teams of volunteers and field them to threatened waterways, where they take regular water samples, compile evidence, and build momentum for state-level enforcement actions focused on specific watersheds...New dam rivaling Grand Coulee suddenly not so unthinkable Workers in coveralls are drilling through the basalt beneath this empty, wind-torn basin to see what it would take to erect a mighty new dam -- a colossal structure as tall as the Space Needle and as wide as the Grand Coulee. It's an odd backward lunge to early-day Northwest efforts to corral nature through monumental feats of engineering. The enormous project pushed by drought-weary Eastern Washington farmers calls for siphoning millions of gallons from the Columbia River and piping it into a downward-sloping valley between Yakima and the Tri-Cities...'Halt water deals', Senator calls on General Land Office to halt water deal negotiations Senator Troy Fraser, R-Horseshoe Bay, asked the Commissioner of the General Land Office to postpone further negotiations with private companies on prospective water deals until legislators can examine the proposals. Fraser, in a letter to GLO Commissioner Jerry Patterson, said he was troubled by recent newspaper accounts of potential water deals being negotiated by the state agency. "In reading about these proposed ventures, I am also surprised at the pace of the negotiations, especially given that the Texas Legislature has not been afforded the opportunity to review the proposals in detail," Fraser wrote. Fraser noted that the Legislature in 1997 enacted major water policy legislation, Senate Bill 1, which created 16 regional water planning districts throughout the state to ensure local control of water planning decisions...Editorial: Waterway words Along some of its course, the river is not much Rio and even less Grande, but its water brings life to fields and cities -- and has been very much in dispute for many years. It is refreshing, then, to see a proposal that would bring the governors of New Mexico, Texas and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila and Tamaulipas together to draft a water agreement. Water from the Rio Grande has been a source of conflict between Mexico and Texas for generations. Bill Richardson, the governor of New Mexico, which also has an interest in the river, doesn't think the U.S. and Mexican governments are paying enough attention...Deer dispute is now federal case Just outside the window of Hollywood Park's town hall, a deer herd was seen Monday afternoon quietly strolling through a hilly yard next door. The four were naturally unaware that a longtime explosive debate about managing their abundant population in this North Side town had just moved hours earlier from nearby town hall to a federal courthouse. Town residents and members of the Hollywood Park Humane Society joined together to file a lawsuit claiming that a much-debated 2002 municipal ordinance is both inhumane to the deer, and unconstitutional to homeowners who should be able to use their land as they want. Under the ordinance, anyone caught feeding deer is subject to a $500 fine, even if the feeding is done on private property. About two dozen citations have been handed out since its December 2002 inception, officials said...Gunfire punctuates Montana's bar culture After he shot his dog but before he murdered the jukebox, Gregory Michael Pepin explained to the bartender that he would dearly love to shoot himself. He just didn't have the nerve. What he did have, as he sat at the bar, was a snootful of tequila and a semiautomatic rifle with 30 bullets in the clip. The bartender, his hands trembling, poured Pepin a drink and tried to talk of happy days. It was going rather well, Roger Malmquist, the bartender, remembers thinking, when the jukebox suddenly started up. As the bartender tells the story, Pepin whirled on his barstool and fired four rounds into the jukebox. The music stopped. Moments later, the phone rang behind the bar. Pepin silenced it with five more bullets. Then the jukebox, wounded but not yet dead, erupted with another song. Pepin whirled again, fired two more rounds and finished it off. The bartender, trembling still, poured Pepin another drink...In Dewey, Mont., blame it on the jukebox "Almost all of these bars had a shooting in them," said Louie Rivenes, bartender for 20 years at the H Bar J. And here in Dewey last month, there was Gregory Pepin, his semiautomatic rifle and the bullet-riddled jukebox. "I talked him out of shooting the five televisions, the mirrored back-bar, the kegs, the windows and the doors," Malmquist said. "I reminded him of how he had changed that flat tire for the gal and how I tabbed him, and he started to calm down." Then, that jukebox played, the phone rang and all hell broke loose. Malmquist said he watched in fear and disbelief as Pepin emptied his 30-round clip...
Monday, January 05, 2004
MAD COW NEWS
Technical Briefing and Webcast On BSE with Government Officials
Jan. 5, 2004
ED CURLETT: Hello, I'd like to welcome everybody to today's BSE update. Today we have Dr. Stephen Sundlof with the Food and Drug Administration. We have Dr. Daniel Engeljohn with the Food Safety and Inspection Service. And we have Dr. Ron DeHaven, the chief veterinary officer for USDA. Dr. DeHaven will make some opening remarks, and then we'll open it up for questions. We ask that you state your name and affiliation prior to asking your question. And with that, I will turn it over to Dr. DeHaven. Thanks.
DR. DEHAVEN: Thank you, Ed. And happy New Year to everyone.
Just a brief opening statement, update today, and then we'll go to the questions and answers, as Ed indicated.
The first item has to do with depopulation of the bull calf operation. We have made a decision to depopulate those bull calves. Those operations will proceed sometime this week, largely dependent upon logistical issues as well as some weather concerns that exist in the Yakima area. The calves will be transported to a slaughter facility that currently is not being used. We will have animal care experts on hand both at the farm where the calves are loaded, as well as the slaughter facility, to ensure humane treatment and handling of those calves. In total there are approximately 450 animals that will be sacrificed as part of this overall effort. And none of the animals will enter the human food chain; nor will any of the product from those animals go into a rendered product. So, again, none of the materials from those materials will either go into the human food chain, nor will they go into a rendered product.
I would just urge restraint on the part of those in the media, and particularly in the Yakima area. We know that there are a number of reporters that are watching this facility, and we would again request that you respect the privacy and property rights of both the owners of the farm in question, as well as not to interfere with these operations once they get underway.
As far as the DNA testing results, that has been proceeding at both of the laboratories, one in Canada and one in the U.S., and we would hope to have some level of announcement later this week once all of the laboratory tests are completed and analyzed, and comparisons made between the results from the two laboratories. So, again, that is still pending, but work is progressing in the laboratories.
In terms of our trace out of the 82 animals that presumably entered the United States, including the positive cow, one would be the index cow. Nine others are known to be part of the index herd from which the positive cow departed immediately before she went to slaughter. One is the animal that I mentioned last week, which is on the Mabton dairy operation. And we believe that one still may be in Canada. Nothing new significant to report at this point on the whereabouts of the other 70 animals. Our epidemiological investigation on those animals continued through the weekend. And while we have made significant progress in terms of tracing where they may have gone subsequent to entering the United States. Nothing confirmed that we can report to you at this point.
And then one last item, before we go to the Qs and As. We are dispatching from Washington a high-level team going to Mexico to have discussions relative to trade restrictions imposed by Mexico subsequent to the finding of this positive case. And we have making up that team Undersecretary Bill Hawks from Marketing Regulatory Programs. And he is accompanied by Undersecretary J.B. Penn of the Farm and Foreign Ag Services.
With that, let's, operator, go to the first question, please.
OPERATOR: Yes, Our first question today comes from Bob Bruin (sp). Please state your affiliation.
BOB BRUIN: Bob Bruin (sp) from Computer World. I'd like to follow up on the national livestock ID system. I'd like to find out where you folks are going to get the funding, if you know what the funding is. Are you going to adhere to the USAIP plan? And how soon can you get this in operation? USAIP calls for July 2004.
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In terms of funding for the animal ID program, still yet to be determined in terms of exactly where those monies would come from and the speed with which we implement -- field and implement that whole system certainly is somewhat dependent on the funding. In the meantime, we are still progressing, developing that plan. We have species-specific groups that will be making recommendations on appropriate means of identification of animals based on the species and marketing patterns of those animals. So, for example, with cattle for the most part and animals moved individually, and as we are looking at appropriate means for individual animal ID, largely based on radio frequency ID chip. For other species of animals, such as poultry and swine that largely move in groups or lots, there could be potentially a lot ID as opposed to individual animal ID. Conceptually, ID would be put on the animals at the time that they leave the premises of birth, and would follow those animals through slaughter, with a means of tracking them electronically as they go through concentration points such as feed lots, livestock markets, and of course to slaughter. So work is progressing. We are still evaluating potential sources of funding to fund that project.
Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: Your next question is from Seth Borenstein. Please state your affiliation.
SETH BORENSTEIN: Seth Borenstein, Knight Ridder Newspapers. Dr. DeHaven, in terms of the 450 animal sacrifice, what's the compensation that the farm owner has gotten? Has that been negotiated already? And who does it come from? And if it's a USDA amount of money, where in the budget does it come from?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In fact, we have an indemnity program that is based on fair market value of those animals. So before the depopulation would begin there would be an agreement in terms of what is fair market value of those animals. We would in essence take ownership of those animals prior to the actual depopulation. There are operational funds that have been made available for the indemnity purposes, so those dollars will come out of USDA funds.
Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: Our next question is from Sally Schuff. Please state your affiliation.
SALLY SCHUFF: Yes, hi, this is Sally Schuff. I'm with Feedstuffs. My question is there's been quite a bit in the news media about the possibility of the U.S. being termed "BSE free." Is that in fact a possibility? And, as a follow up, can you tell us how soon you knew after the cow was diagnosed that she might have been a Canadian cow?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In terms of whether or not the U.S. would be declared as BSE free is just simply way too premature to make that kind of determination, and for the most part while we may or may not make that declaration, if we would it would be up to each importing country who might import animals or products from the U.S. to do their own risk assessment and make that evaluation. Clearly at the appropriate time in the future we would be presenting a packet of dossier to the OIE, the international standard-setting body, requesting country categorization. But, again, any efforts in that regard would be way premature at this point to make that declaration.
Clearly our efforts to trace this particular animal as well as any other animals that might have come with her from the index herd -- or, excuse me, the birth herd -- would be critical in terms of our being able to, at whatever point in the future, being able to make some kind of determination -- or making our case, if you will, in terms of a BSE free status for the U.S.
And I'm sorry, the second part of your question again?
SALLY SCHUFF: The second part of my question was: How soon after the diagnosis of this BSE cow in the U.S. were you aware that she was a Canadian cow, or had at least a Canadian ear tag?
DR. DEHAVEN: Well, I would remind you that the confirmation was received on December 23rd. And so it was a number of days -- I want to say three or four days where we had some definitive paper trail back to Canada. We knew early on that she had a tag in her ear that was consistent with what tags are applied in Canada. But it wasn't until three or four days later that we had actually established with our Canadian colleagues some paper trail, which would suggest that she had been in, or come from Canada. And, as you will recall, we had the age discrepancy issue, which we think we have subsequently resolved. So it was four or five days, and again I would remind everyone that in the middle of that we had Christmas; and for the Canadians we had Boxing Day. So we were working through weekends and holidays to come to that determination. And I think we announced that to the media very shortly after having seen those documents and establishing a paper trail.
Next question, operator?
OPERATOR: Our next question comes from Leah Beth Ward. Please state your affiliation.
LEAH BETH WARD: Yes, Yakima Herald Republic. Explain to us what led you first to Eastport, Idaho as the port of entry, and then to Oroville, Washington. And does that at all change your confidence in the source of the cow?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. There was more than one health certificate involved, and I can't -- I don't have the specific records that led us initially to Eastport, Idaho and then subsequently to Oroville, Washington, but I think it's a matter of having multiple documents. And while we have preliminary information, and as I said repeatedly our primary line of inquiry takes us back to a dairy herd in Alberta, Canada, and we know that the animal ended up in the herd in Mabton, Washington, the exact route on how she got between those two points was in question, initially because of multiple documents that had some conflicting information. So I think the most relevant points are that we at least have a primary line of inquiry that would take us back to what we at least at this point in time think is the likely birth herd. We know where she ended up. We know what animals accompanied her. So those are the most important pieces of information -- not the exact port from which she entered the U.S. So the short answer to your question is no, it really doesn't shake our confidence in terms of our tracing ability as it relates to this investigation.
Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: The next question is from Beth Gorman (sp). Please state your affiliation.
BETH GORMAN: Hi, Beth Gorman from the Canadian Press. Dr. DeHaven today is the deadline for public comment on reopening the border to Canadian live cattle. When do you expect to have or to see some kind of a decision on that? And will those public comments be reopened at some point in the future?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. Thanks for the question. Indeed our public comment period on the proposed rule does close today. We have at this point decided that we will not take any action at this point on that proposed rule, pending the outcome of the epidemiological investigation. After we have all of the relevant information from that investigation, as well as the consideration of the comments that are received by the close of business today, then at the appropriate time in the future we'll make a decision on how to proceed from there. And that decision obviously has not been made yet. Whether it would proceed to a final rule, proceed with the new proposal; proceed with an additional comment period on the existing proposal. There's been no limit in terms of the options that might be considered, or at what point we would make those determinations. We'll make that decision subsequent to completing this epidemiological investigation, and take all of that relevant information into account when we decide on how to proceed with the proposed rule.
Next question, please, operator?
OPERATOR: Okay, next question comes from Elizabeth Weise. Please state your affiliation.
ELIZABETH WEISE: Yes, It's Elizabeth Weise with USA Today. Just a background question on the DNA testing. Seeing as you're testing the sire's semen and the offspring, is there a percentage of likelihood that you found the right cow, or is it 100 percent? Is it somewhere below that?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In terms of what will be disclosed in the DNA testing could be anywhere in between I think the range that you said, and most likely a probability rating. Without getting too technical, in doing the DNA testing what they are looking at is specific points along the DNA chain, and looking for similarities between the different samples that have been submitted, and based on the number of points along that chain that are similar between the different samples; then attaching a probability to that. So it won't be -- more than likely will not be something that we can absolutely 100 percent guarantee, but rather as you are suggesting some probability based on the numbers of points along the DNA molecule where there are identical results, or where the molecule is identical between the different samples.
We are, as you said, running a number of samples, the two most important of which would be the DNA from the semen from what we think is the sire of the infected cow, as well as DNA from the brain of the positive cow. But we also have gotten samples from progeny from the cow in question, as well as semen from sires from those progeny.
Operator, next question?
OPERATOR: Our next question comes from Harry Siemans (sp). Please state your affiliation.
HARRY SIEMENS: Yes, this is Harry Siemens, and I'm from Farm Watch, the Manitoba Cooperator. If indeed that cow is identified as being from Canada that obviously raised our cow number with BSE from one to two. Does that in your opinion raise our risk level a substantial amount? I know it's 50 percent, but what do you have on -- what's your take on that?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. I think it's too early to make that kind of determination, because there's too many other factors that we don't yet have -- or too many other pieces of information that we don't yet have in terms of what would be, if any, epidemiological link between those two cases. And you know the closer the epidemiology might be in terms of linking those two situations could result in different conclusions being drawn, or I should say the level of epidemiological connection or lack thereof could have a significant bearing on our overall evaluation of the prevalence of the disease in Canada, which of course is important.
Having said that, I would just echo what I have been saying in terms of the fact that the two markets between the U.S. and Canada we know are highly integrated. Second, we know a lot about the firewalls and safeguards that had been in place both in the United States and Canada. So all of those things would be taken into consideration as well.
HARRY SIEMENS: Do you think it matters to Japan as far as it being from Canada or the U.S.?
DR. DEHAVEN: I wouldn't at this point speculate with regard to what Japan -- or speak on behalf of what Japan may think at this point.
MR. CURLETT: This is Ed Curlett, and I would ask that everyone keep their questions just to one. We've got a lot of people on the call, so we want to try to get in as many as we can. So, thanks. And, operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: Okay, next question is from Marion Aka (sp). Please state your affiliation.
MARION AKA: Hi, I'm from CNN. And if you could just clarify, because I missed the top because I was disconnected, where the depopulation will take place, what exactly the relationship is to the index cow? And my question is I know that the food from or meat from that cow never entered the food chain. What about the saw, the equipment that was used to cut up the index cow. Has that been removed? Since prions can't be sanitized off, you made a point to make clear that where the depopulation will take place will be in a currently unused facility. But what about the facility that originally chopped up the index cow? How is it not being spread that way?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. I'll take your first question, and defer to Dr. Engeljohn from FSIS for the second question. Actually I didn't by intent state an exact location where the depopulation will take place. The calves will be loaded from their current location, the calf feeding operation. They will then be moved to a location, which is a slaughter plant that is not currently being used, where they will be properly euthanized. So just out of the interest of ensuring lack of interference with our operation, as well as the privacy and property rights of the owners of those different facilities, we are not going to disclose the exact locations.
MARION AKA: But it's --
DR. DEHAVEN: Dr. Engeljohn, do you want to take the second question?
DR. ENGELJOHN: Yes. This is Dr. Engeljohn with the Food Safety Inspection Service. With regards to the slaughter and processing of the animal, this was an animal that was initially identified as a suspect, so it was handled specially in the sense that it was handled separately from the other cattle that were processed that day.
But with regard to overall sanitation, we know from the best available science and expert opinion that good sanitation is our best preventative measure that we have in place of prevention of cross-contamination. And so we have sanitation occurring in that plant for which we monitor well. We also know that on that particular day that we did in fact monitor the sanitation there as well. So we have confidence that the sanitation was effective.
MR. CURLETT: Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: The next question comes from Scott Kilman. Please state your affiliation.
SCOTT KILMAN: Scott Kilman with the Wall Street Journal. Dr. DeHaven, in the first part of your presentation it was hard to hear, so I was going to ask really two questions -- one a clarification. Did you say whether the cattle, the bull calves, the brains of those bull calves, would be tested for BSE? And then my question is: Why are the precautions that Secretary Veneman announced last week different from what the FSIS was considering in their thinking paper a year ago? If I remember, the FSIS was talking about targeting cattle that were 24 months. And last week we heard a lot about 30 months.
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. I'll take your first question, and then again refer to Dr. Engeljohn for response to the second part of your question. In terms of testing the brain, we know from the science and the research involved with this particular disease that it doesn't show up -- the prion doesn't show up, and therefore tests would not be positive, even in infected animals, until typically after 30 months of age. And in fact the most accepted and broadly quoted studies being done in Britain would suggest that even in animals experimentally infected with a high dose, you don't find the prion or the infectious agent even in brain tissue until typically at the earliest 32 months of age. So there would be no purpose in testing all of these animals, because even in the unlikely event that there had been maternal transmission to this single bull calf, the calf would not test positive at this point in time.
Having said that, just as a precaution, we will be collecting blood samples from the appropriate subpopulation or subgroup of animals that are going to be euthanized, so if we should need to do some DNA testing or other type of testing we would have those materials in the future. But, again, the science would say that to test all of those brains would not be fruitful, in that you wouldn't expect, even if there had been transmission of the disease, which is unlikely, but even if there had been the animal would not test positive.
Dr. Engeljohn?
DR. ENGELJOHN: Yes, this is Dr. Engeljohn with the Food Safety Inspection Service. On the question about why 30 months in the policy issued last week versus 24 months in the current thinking paper that we issued in February of 2002, the reason is that when we first commissioned Harvard to conduct a risk assessment for us at that time, we were considering a range of months in terms of infectivity to consider. And 24 months was what was modeled back in 1998. We received that report just before
February of 2002. And so it was based on the best available information that we had at that time. I think since then, in terms of the international community, 30 months is the marker for which typically is used for modeling age of onset.
MR. CURLETT: Operator, we have time for two more questions.
OPERATOR: Okay, our next question comes from Lauri Struve. Please state your affiliation.
LAURI STRUVE: This is Lauri Struve with the Brownfield Network. And, Dr. DeHaven, my question is on the non-ambulatory rules does include, if I understand it correctly, that does include animals injured in transport. What kind of compensation will producers have for those animals? We could be talking about a 1,200-pound steer that would grade out choice. That's over $1,000.
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. You are right in terms of the fact that animals that might be injured en route to slaughter, if they meet the FSIS definition of non-ambulatory disabled at the time that they are received at slaughter, they would not enter the food chain. We are as we speak developing our surveillance-testing plan, and so I am just not in a position at this point to respond to what if any compensation might go to the owner of such an animal. It's just premature to speculate if that would even happen at all. We are developing the plan, and I can assure you that all of those kinds of considerations will be taken into account as we make those decisions, but no decision has been made yet.
So, operator, last question please.
OPERATOR: Okay, our last question comes from Andy Dworkin. Please state your affiliation.
ANDY DWORKIN: Yes, with the Oregonian. I was wondering in terms of disposal of these cattle once they are taking to the slaughter facility and killed how you guys are going to deal with this. I know at least for chronic wasting some of the states have debated high-temperature incinerators or processing with high alkaline fluids and things. Have you guys figured out what you are going to do with the carcasses yet?
DR. DEHAVEN: And let me clarify you are talking about the bull calves?
ANDY DWORKIN: These are the bull calves, yeah, that you guys are going to depopulate.
DR. DEHAVEN: Well, again, I would go back to the science of the situation. We are talking about one bull calf that we know is from the positive cow. We know that that calf is just slightly over a month in age. We know that the likelihood of the disease being transmitted from the cow to this calf is very remote. And we know that even if the transmission did occur that the infectious agent wouldn't be found in this animal until probably 30 months of age or older. So, one, even if the calf is infected, there would be no infectious agent at this point for which we would be concerned about, and so no reason to go to the extreme measures that you are describing. So we do not plan at this point to do the alkaline digester or any other extreme measure, such as incineration, simply because what we know about the disease and the research of the disease would suggest that those types of measures in this situation are not warranted. Those are the kinds of actions that we would take in a population that would be of the appropriate age and appropriate level of exposure that those would be necessary.
With that, again, before I pass it back to Ed, let me thank everyone for participating, and we will do our best to keep you informed through these kinds of briefings. Ed?
MR. CURLETT: Yes, this is Ed. Just want to let you know for follow-up questions call 202-720-4623. And also from this point forward we are going to be doing these technical briefings on an as-needed basis. As information becomes available to us, we will pass it along. Look for the announcement on the USDA homepage for these technical briefings. So, again, from this point forward we will be doing these as needed. Transcripts will be available on the USDA website. And we will be sending out a note to reporters when those technical briefings will occur. And, with that, I would like to thank everyone again. And thank you very much.
OPERATOR: Thank you. That concludes today's conference call.
USDA to kill 450 calves in mad cow scare U.S. agriculture officials have decided to kill 450 calves in a Washington state herd that includes an offspring of the cow diagnosed with mad cow disease. Ron DeHaven, the Agriculture Department's chief veterinarian, said Monday that the month-old calves would be slaughtered this week at an undisclosed facility that is not being used. He also announced that USDA officials would visit Mexico to discuss that country's ban on American beef products following the diagnosis last month of the first U.S. case of mad cow disease. Mexico is one of more than 30 countries to halt U.S. beef imports. The herd that is to be destroyed is one of three under quarantine in Washington because of ties to the diseased Holstein. The other herds contain cows that probably are from the same Alberta farm as the 6-year-old Holstein, but DNA tests to confirm the cow's origins are not complete. Officials decided to kill all month-old calves in the Sunnyside, Wash., herd because they cannot determine which one was born to the infected cow. While officials have said contaminated feed is the most likely source of infection, they cannot rule out transmission of the disease from mother to calf...Sales off for La. cattle farmers Monday Louisiana cattle prices were off slightly but volume was down substantially in the state's first auctions since last month's mad cow scare, the state Department of Agriculture and Forestry reported Monday. Louisiana's cattle industry shuts down during the two weeks of Christmas and New Year's. The first cattle sales scheduled in Louisiana since the mad cow announcement were held Monday throughout the state, and the number of cattle sold was a fraction of pre-announcement totals. In West Monroe the drop was from around 600 to about 200, in Baton Rouge the number went from 400 to 100, and in Kinder the drop was from 1000 to around 170 head of cattle. By contrast, however, prices were comparatively stable, according to the agriculture department. Cows for slaughter were only off by a few dollars per hundred pounds, and feeder cattle were off by about five dollars...Number of cattle at West Texas auction down significantly The number of cattle for sale at Tulia's livestock auction was down about 70 percent from normal Monday as few producers wanted to be the first to sell their stock since mad cow disease was found in the United States. Rather than buying, many who attended came to see what the prices were like at the Tulia Livestock Auction. "It's hurt the pocketbook," auction manager Mark Hargrave. "The cattle industry has lost a lot of money." A 615-pound steer brought the highest price at $89.50 per 100 pounds - about $10 less per 100 pounds than what it would have sold for during the last Tulia auction on Dec. 22. "It wasn't near as bad as everybody thought it would be," Hargrave said of the prices. "Everyone was encouraged. It was lower but it wasn't a wreck." Typically, there are about 3,000 cattle at the auction, one of the two largest in the Panhandle region, Hargrave said. About 800 were up for sale Monday...Cattle Farmers Watch Anxiously As Sales Resume Like many cattle farmers, Jeff Riester was an anxious spectator Monday as cattle sales resumed at Blue Grass Stockyards in Lexington for the first time since the mad cow disease scare. Riester and others expressed relief as prices fell only slightly during light sales at the Lexington stockyard. Other cattle markets will reopen in Kentucky this week after the long holiday break. Kentucky is the leading beef cattle producer east of the Mississippi River. Prices on Monday dropped, on average, by $5 to $10 per hundredweight from the last sales in December, said David Holt, assistant manager at the Lexington stockyard. Some cattle producers had braced for the possibility that prices would fall by $25 to $30 per hundredweight, he said. "It's a very light volume today because everybody was nervous about what was going to happen," Holt said. "We've had a crowd of farmers sitting and watching. But now the talk is very positive." The Lexington stockyard typically sells 2,500 to 3,000 cattle on the first sales day of the new year, Holt said. On Monday, only 350 cattle went on the auction block...Economist sees $70 cattle in first quarter, upper $60s later "Where do prices go from here?" That's the question on every cattle producer's mind at this point, says Darrell Mark, University of Nebraska ag economist. Barring decreases in domestic consumer demand and assuming no additional mad cow cases are found in the US, fed cattle prices are likely to trade in the mid- to upper-$70s during the first quarter of 2004, he says. That's the low end of normal, says another ag economist."The loss of US beef exports represents about 10% of US production," Purdue ag economist Chris Hurt said in a release December 24. "If all other factors remain the same, we would look for a 12% to 16% drop in cattle prices. This probably adds up to a $2 billion hit to the beef industry at the farm level in 2004...Japan looks at taking more NZ beef A delegation of Japanese officials is to arrive on Monday to discuss increasing New Zealand beef exports to Japan in the wake of a case of madcow disease in the United States. A Meat New Zealand spokeswoman said the delegation included three Japanese officials, from the equivalent of New Zealand's Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF). The group was also to speak to Australian officials about its beef trade with Japan. "What they are going to do is talk about supply, because Japan has said it won't take beef from the US now," she said...Cattlemen, feedlots stock up in hope of more sales to Japan Australian cattleman Scott de Bruin plans to raise 20 per cent more cattle this year, betting a ban on US beef means higher sales to Japan and South Korea. The two Asian nations are among more than 30 countries that barred US beef after one case of mad cow disease was found in a Washington state herd. Japan and Korea buy about two-thirds of US beef exports, which totalled as much as $US3.8 billion ($4.97 billion) in 2003. A shortage of the fatty US meat many Japanese prefer means higher prices for graziers like Mr de Bruin, who this year aims to sell 300 Wagyu cattle, the breed producing Japan's Kobe beef. For Australia, the world's biggest beef exporter, US misfortune may reverse a two-year slide in sales as the weakening US dollar made Australian exports more expensive...Mad cow, other brain diseases, mystify scientists For all the worry mad cow disease is generating, it's just one in a family of 10 diseases discovered so far - five in animals, five in humans - that are arguably medicine's most mystifying maladies. Most so-called prion diseases are incredibly rare in this country, although one has spread into deer and elk herds in at least 12 states, sparking concern about contaminated game meat. Yet scientists can't answer the most basic questions about prions, even though learning how the rogue proteins cause sponge-like holes in brains could improve understanding of more common neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's...Japan Critical Of US Safeguards Japan on Monday questioned the effectiveness of U.S. safeguards against bovine spongiform encephalopathy, suggesting Tokyo would hold out for stricter U.S. screening of livestock before lifting an import ban on U.S. beef. Following the discovery of the first U.S. case of BSE, commonly known as mad cow disease, last month, the U.S. announced new restrictions on beef aimed at keeping cow brains, eyes, spinal cords and small intestines and the meat of "downer cows" that can't walk or stand on their own from entering the food supply. But Vice Agriculture Minister Yoshiaki Watanabe indicated U.S. action hasn't quieted concerns in Japan about the safety of American beef. "They are not as effective as steps being taken in Japan," Watanabe told a news conference on Monday. Confused About Mad Cow? New Ad Exposes Scaremongers and Dispels Myths The best science available says, overwhelmingly, that mad cow disease poses near-zero risk to American consumers. Yet activists -- many with hidden political or financial agendas -- continue to promote needless food scare myths in order to frighten consumers. With a new full-page ad on the back cover of this week's national edition of U.S. News & World Report, the Center for Consumer Freedom aims to shatter these myths and reveal America's newest class of scaremongers. At www.ConsumerFreedom.com, readers can learn the latest about the mad-cow scare, get straight answers to Frequently Asked Questions, and see responses to the misinformation promoted by a rogues gallery of mad-cow alarmists including:...
Technical Briefing and Webcast On BSE with Government Officials
Jan. 5, 2004
ED CURLETT: Hello, I'd like to welcome everybody to today's BSE update. Today we have Dr. Stephen Sundlof with the Food and Drug Administration. We have Dr. Daniel Engeljohn with the Food Safety and Inspection Service. And we have Dr. Ron DeHaven, the chief veterinary officer for USDA. Dr. DeHaven will make some opening remarks, and then we'll open it up for questions. We ask that you state your name and affiliation prior to asking your question. And with that, I will turn it over to Dr. DeHaven. Thanks.
DR. DEHAVEN: Thank you, Ed. And happy New Year to everyone.
Just a brief opening statement, update today, and then we'll go to the questions and answers, as Ed indicated.
The first item has to do with depopulation of the bull calf operation. We have made a decision to depopulate those bull calves. Those operations will proceed sometime this week, largely dependent upon logistical issues as well as some weather concerns that exist in the Yakima area. The calves will be transported to a slaughter facility that currently is not being used. We will have animal care experts on hand both at the farm where the calves are loaded, as well as the slaughter facility, to ensure humane treatment and handling of those calves. In total there are approximately 450 animals that will be sacrificed as part of this overall effort. And none of the animals will enter the human food chain; nor will any of the product from those animals go into a rendered product. So, again, none of the materials from those materials will either go into the human food chain, nor will they go into a rendered product.
I would just urge restraint on the part of those in the media, and particularly in the Yakima area. We know that there are a number of reporters that are watching this facility, and we would again request that you respect the privacy and property rights of both the owners of the farm in question, as well as not to interfere with these operations once they get underway.
As far as the DNA testing results, that has been proceeding at both of the laboratories, one in Canada and one in the U.S., and we would hope to have some level of announcement later this week once all of the laboratory tests are completed and analyzed, and comparisons made between the results from the two laboratories. So, again, that is still pending, but work is progressing in the laboratories.
In terms of our trace out of the 82 animals that presumably entered the United States, including the positive cow, one would be the index cow. Nine others are known to be part of the index herd from which the positive cow departed immediately before she went to slaughter. One is the animal that I mentioned last week, which is on the Mabton dairy operation. And we believe that one still may be in Canada. Nothing new significant to report at this point on the whereabouts of the other 70 animals. Our epidemiological investigation on those animals continued through the weekend. And while we have made significant progress in terms of tracing where they may have gone subsequent to entering the United States. Nothing confirmed that we can report to you at this point.
And then one last item, before we go to the Qs and As. We are dispatching from Washington a high-level team going to Mexico to have discussions relative to trade restrictions imposed by Mexico subsequent to the finding of this positive case. And we have making up that team Undersecretary Bill Hawks from Marketing Regulatory Programs. And he is accompanied by Undersecretary J.B. Penn of the Farm and Foreign Ag Services.
With that, let's, operator, go to the first question, please.
OPERATOR: Yes, Our first question today comes from Bob Bruin (sp). Please state your affiliation.
BOB BRUIN: Bob Bruin (sp) from Computer World. I'd like to follow up on the national livestock ID system. I'd like to find out where you folks are going to get the funding, if you know what the funding is. Are you going to adhere to the USAIP plan? And how soon can you get this in operation? USAIP calls for July 2004.
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In terms of funding for the animal ID program, still yet to be determined in terms of exactly where those monies would come from and the speed with which we implement -- field and implement that whole system certainly is somewhat dependent on the funding. In the meantime, we are still progressing, developing that plan. We have species-specific groups that will be making recommendations on appropriate means of identification of animals based on the species and marketing patterns of those animals. So, for example, with cattle for the most part and animals moved individually, and as we are looking at appropriate means for individual animal ID, largely based on radio frequency ID chip. For other species of animals, such as poultry and swine that largely move in groups or lots, there could be potentially a lot ID as opposed to individual animal ID. Conceptually, ID would be put on the animals at the time that they leave the premises of birth, and would follow those animals through slaughter, with a means of tracking them electronically as they go through concentration points such as feed lots, livestock markets, and of course to slaughter. So work is progressing. We are still evaluating potential sources of funding to fund that project.
Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: Your next question is from Seth Borenstein. Please state your affiliation.
SETH BORENSTEIN: Seth Borenstein, Knight Ridder Newspapers. Dr. DeHaven, in terms of the 450 animal sacrifice, what's the compensation that the farm owner has gotten? Has that been negotiated already? And who does it come from? And if it's a USDA amount of money, where in the budget does it come from?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In fact, we have an indemnity program that is based on fair market value of those animals. So before the depopulation would begin there would be an agreement in terms of what is fair market value of those animals. We would in essence take ownership of those animals prior to the actual depopulation. There are operational funds that have been made available for the indemnity purposes, so those dollars will come out of USDA funds.
Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: Our next question is from Sally Schuff. Please state your affiliation.
SALLY SCHUFF: Yes, hi, this is Sally Schuff. I'm with Feedstuffs. My question is there's been quite a bit in the news media about the possibility of the U.S. being termed "BSE free." Is that in fact a possibility? And, as a follow up, can you tell us how soon you knew after the cow was diagnosed that she might have been a Canadian cow?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In terms of whether or not the U.S. would be declared as BSE free is just simply way too premature to make that kind of determination, and for the most part while we may or may not make that declaration, if we would it would be up to each importing country who might import animals or products from the U.S. to do their own risk assessment and make that evaluation. Clearly at the appropriate time in the future we would be presenting a packet of dossier to the OIE, the international standard-setting body, requesting country categorization. But, again, any efforts in that regard would be way premature at this point to make that declaration.
Clearly our efforts to trace this particular animal as well as any other animals that might have come with her from the index herd -- or, excuse me, the birth herd -- would be critical in terms of our being able to, at whatever point in the future, being able to make some kind of determination -- or making our case, if you will, in terms of a BSE free status for the U.S.
And I'm sorry, the second part of your question again?
SALLY SCHUFF: The second part of my question was: How soon after the diagnosis of this BSE cow in the U.S. were you aware that she was a Canadian cow, or had at least a Canadian ear tag?
DR. DEHAVEN: Well, I would remind you that the confirmation was received on December 23rd. And so it was a number of days -- I want to say three or four days where we had some definitive paper trail back to Canada. We knew early on that she had a tag in her ear that was consistent with what tags are applied in Canada. But it wasn't until three or four days later that we had actually established with our Canadian colleagues some paper trail, which would suggest that she had been in, or come from Canada. And, as you will recall, we had the age discrepancy issue, which we think we have subsequently resolved. So it was four or five days, and again I would remind everyone that in the middle of that we had Christmas; and for the Canadians we had Boxing Day. So we were working through weekends and holidays to come to that determination. And I think we announced that to the media very shortly after having seen those documents and establishing a paper trail.
Next question, operator?
OPERATOR: Our next question comes from Leah Beth Ward. Please state your affiliation.
LEAH BETH WARD: Yes, Yakima Herald Republic. Explain to us what led you first to Eastport, Idaho as the port of entry, and then to Oroville, Washington. And does that at all change your confidence in the source of the cow?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. There was more than one health certificate involved, and I can't -- I don't have the specific records that led us initially to Eastport, Idaho and then subsequently to Oroville, Washington, but I think it's a matter of having multiple documents. And while we have preliminary information, and as I said repeatedly our primary line of inquiry takes us back to a dairy herd in Alberta, Canada, and we know that the animal ended up in the herd in Mabton, Washington, the exact route on how she got between those two points was in question, initially because of multiple documents that had some conflicting information. So I think the most relevant points are that we at least have a primary line of inquiry that would take us back to what we at least at this point in time think is the likely birth herd. We know where she ended up. We know what animals accompanied her. So those are the most important pieces of information -- not the exact port from which she entered the U.S. So the short answer to your question is no, it really doesn't shake our confidence in terms of our tracing ability as it relates to this investigation.
Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: The next question is from Beth Gorman (sp). Please state your affiliation.
BETH GORMAN: Hi, Beth Gorman from the Canadian Press. Dr. DeHaven today is the deadline for public comment on reopening the border to Canadian live cattle. When do you expect to have or to see some kind of a decision on that? And will those public comments be reopened at some point in the future?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. Thanks for the question. Indeed our public comment period on the proposed rule does close today. We have at this point decided that we will not take any action at this point on that proposed rule, pending the outcome of the epidemiological investigation. After we have all of the relevant information from that investigation, as well as the consideration of the comments that are received by the close of business today, then at the appropriate time in the future we'll make a decision on how to proceed from there. And that decision obviously has not been made yet. Whether it would proceed to a final rule, proceed with the new proposal; proceed with an additional comment period on the existing proposal. There's been no limit in terms of the options that might be considered, or at what point we would make those determinations. We'll make that decision subsequent to completing this epidemiological investigation, and take all of that relevant information into account when we decide on how to proceed with the proposed rule.
Next question, please, operator?
OPERATOR: Okay, next question comes from Elizabeth Weise. Please state your affiliation.
ELIZABETH WEISE: Yes, It's Elizabeth Weise with USA Today. Just a background question on the DNA testing. Seeing as you're testing the sire's semen and the offspring, is there a percentage of likelihood that you found the right cow, or is it 100 percent? Is it somewhere below that?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. In terms of what will be disclosed in the DNA testing could be anywhere in between I think the range that you said, and most likely a probability rating. Without getting too technical, in doing the DNA testing what they are looking at is specific points along the DNA chain, and looking for similarities between the different samples that have been submitted, and based on the number of points along that chain that are similar between the different samples; then attaching a probability to that. So it won't be -- more than likely will not be something that we can absolutely 100 percent guarantee, but rather as you are suggesting some probability based on the numbers of points along the DNA molecule where there are identical results, or where the molecule is identical between the different samples.
We are, as you said, running a number of samples, the two most important of which would be the DNA from the semen from what we think is the sire of the infected cow, as well as DNA from the brain of the positive cow. But we also have gotten samples from progeny from the cow in question, as well as semen from sires from those progeny.
Operator, next question?
OPERATOR: Our next question comes from Harry Siemans (sp). Please state your affiliation.
HARRY SIEMENS: Yes, this is Harry Siemens, and I'm from Farm Watch, the Manitoba Cooperator. If indeed that cow is identified as being from Canada that obviously raised our cow number with BSE from one to two. Does that in your opinion raise our risk level a substantial amount? I know it's 50 percent, but what do you have on -- what's your take on that?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. I think it's too early to make that kind of determination, because there's too many other factors that we don't yet have -- or too many other pieces of information that we don't yet have in terms of what would be, if any, epidemiological link between those two cases. And you know the closer the epidemiology might be in terms of linking those two situations could result in different conclusions being drawn, or I should say the level of epidemiological connection or lack thereof could have a significant bearing on our overall evaluation of the prevalence of the disease in Canada, which of course is important.
Having said that, I would just echo what I have been saying in terms of the fact that the two markets between the U.S. and Canada we know are highly integrated. Second, we know a lot about the firewalls and safeguards that had been in place both in the United States and Canada. So all of those things would be taken into consideration as well.
HARRY SIEMENS: Do you think it matters to Japan as far as it being from Canada or the U.S.?
DR. DEHAVEN: I wouldn't at this point speculate with regard to what Japan -- or speak on behalf of what Japan may think at this point.
MR. CURLETT: This is Ed Curlett, and I would ask that everyone keep their questions just to one. We've got a lot of people on the call, so we want to try to get in as many as we can. So, thanks. And, operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: Okay, next question is from Marion Aka (sp). Please state your affiliation.
MARION AKA: Hi, I'm from CNN. And if you could just clarify, because I missed the top because I was disconnected, where the depopulation will take place, what exactly the relationship is to the index cow? And my question is I know that the food from or meat from that cow never entered the food chain. What about the saw, the equipment that was used to cut up the index cow. Has that been removed? Since prions can't be sanitized off, you made a point to make clear that where the depopulation will take place will be in a currently unused facility. But what about the facility that originally chopped up the index cow? How is it not being spread that way?
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. I'll take your first question, and defer to Dr. Engeljohn from FSIS for the second question. Actually I didn't by intent state an exact location where the depopulation will take place. The calves will be loaded from their current location, the calf feeding operation. They will then be moved to a location, which is a slaughter plant that is not currently being used, where they will be properly euthanized. So just out of the interest of ensuring lack of interference with our operation, as well as the privacy and property rights of the owners of those different facilities, we are not going to disclose the exact locations.
MARION AKA: But it's --
DR. DEHAVEN: Dr. Engeljohn, do you want to take the second question?
DR. ENGELJOHN: Yes. This is Dr. Engeljohn with the Food Safety Inspection Service. With regards to the slaughter and processing of the animal, this was an animal that was initially identified as a suspect, so it was handled specially in the sense that it was handled separately from the other cattle that were processed that day.
But with regard to overall sanitation, we know from the best available science and expert opinion that good sanitation is our best preventative measure that we have in place of prevention of cross-contamination. And so we have sanitation occurring in that plant for which we monitor well. We also know that on that particular day that we did in fact monitor the sanitation there as well. So we have confidence that the sanitation was effective.
MR. CURLETT: Operator, next question please?
OPERATOR: The next question comes from Scott Kilman. Please state your affiliation.
SCOTT KILMAN: Scott Kilman with the Wall Street Journal. Dr. DeHaven, in the first part of your presentation it was hard to hear, so I was going to ask really two questions -- one a clarification. Did you say whether the cattle, the bull calves, the brains of those bull calves, would be tested for BSE? And then my question is: Why are the precautions that Secretary Veneman announced last week different from what the FSIS was considering in their thinking paper a year ago? If I remember, the FSIS was talking about targeting cattle that were 24 months. And last week we heard a lot about 30 months.
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. I'll take your first question, and then again refer to Dr. Engeljohn for response to the second part of your question. In terms of testing the brain, we know from the science and the research involved with this particular disease that it doesn't show up -- the prion doesn't show up, and therefore tests would not be positive, even in infected animals, until typically after 30 months of age. And in fact the most accepted and broadly quoted studies being done in Britain would suggest that even in animals experimentally infected with a high dose, you don't find the prion or the infectious agent even in brain tissue until typically at the earliest 32 months of age. So there would be no purpose in testing all of these animals, because even in the unlikely event that there had been maternal transmission to this single bull calf, the calf would not test positive at this point in time.
Having said that, just as a precaution, we will be collecting blood samples from the appropriate subpopulation or subgroup of animals that are going to be euthanized, so if we should need to do some DNA testing or other type of testing we would have those materials in the future. But, again, the science would say that to test all of those brains would not be fruitful, in that you wouldn't expect, even if there had been transmission of the disease, which is unlikely, but even if there had been the animal would not test positive.
Dr. Engeljohn?
DR. ENGELJOHN: Yes, this is Dr. Engeljohn with the Food Safety Inspection Service. On the question about why 30 months in the policy issued last week versus 24 months in the current thinking paper that we issued in February of 2002, the reason is that when we first commissioned Harvard to conduct a risk assessment for us at that time, we were considering a range of months in terms of infectivity to consider. And 24 months was what was modeled back in 1998. We received that report just before
February of 2002. And so it was based on the best available information that we had at that time. I think since then, in terms of the international community, 30 months is the marker for which typically is used for modeling age of onset.
MR. CURLETT: Operator, we have time for two more questions.
OPERATOR: Okay, our next question comes from Lauri Struve. Please state your affiliation.
LAURI STRUVE: This is Lauri Struve with the Brownfield Network. And, Dr. DeHaven, my question is on the non-ambulatory rules does include, if I understand it correctly, that does include animals injured in transport. What kind of compensation will producers have for those animals? We could be talking about a 1,200-pound steer that would grade out choice. That's over $1,000.
DR. DEHAVEN: This is Dr. DeHaven. You are right in terms of the fact that animals that might be injured en route to slaughter, if they meet the FSIS definition of non-ambulatory disabled at the time that they are received at slaughter, they would not enter the food chain. We are as we speak developing our surveillance-testing plan, and so I am just not in a position at this point to respond to what if any compensation might go to the owner of such an animal. It's just premature to speculate if that would even happen at all. We are developing the plan, and I can assure you that all of those kinds of considerations will be taken into account as we make those decisions, but no decision has been made yet.
So, operator, last question please.
OPERATOR: Okay, our last question comes from Andy Dworkin. Please state your affiliation.
ANDY DWORKIN: Yes, with the Oregonian. I was wondering in terms of disposal of these cattle once they are taking to the slaughter facility and killed how you guys are going to deal with this. I know at least for chronic wasting some of the states have debated high-temperature incinerators or processing with high alkaline fluids and things. Have you guys figured out what you are going to do with the carcasses yet?
DR. DEHAVEN: And let me clarify you are talking about the bull calves?
ANDY DWORKIN: These are the bull calves, yeah, that you guys are going to depopulate.
DR. DEHAVEN: Well, again, I would go back to the science of the situation. We are talking about one bull calf that we know is from the positive cow. We know that that calf is just slightly over a month in age. We know that the likelihood of the disease being transmitted from the cow to this calf is very remote. And we know that even if the transmission did occur that the infectious agent wouldn't be found in this animal until probably 30 months of age or older. So, one, even if the calf is infected, there would be no infectious agent at this point for which we would be concerned about, and so no reason to go to the extreme measures that you are describing. So we do not plan at this point to do the alkaline digester or any other extreme measure, such as incineration, simply because what we know about the disease and the research of the disease would suggest that those types of measures in this situation are not warranted. Those are the kinds of actions that we would take in a population that would be of the appropriate age and appropriate level of exposure that those would be necessary.
With that, again, before I pass it back to Ed, let me thank everyone for participating, and we will do our best to keep you informed through these kinds of briefings. Ed?
MR. CURLETT: Yes, this is Ed. Just want to let you know for follow-up questions call 202-720-4623. And also from this point forward we are going to be doing these technical briefings on an as-needed basis. As information becomes available to us, we will pass it along. Look for the announcement on the USDA homepage for these technical briefings. So, again, from this point forward we will be doing these as needed. Transcripts will be available on the USDA website. And we will be sending out a note to reporters when those technical briefings will occur. And, with that, I would like to thank everyone again. And thank you very much.
OPERATOR: Thank you. That concludes today's conference call.
USDA to kill 450 calves in mad cow scare U.S. agriculture officials have decided to kill 450 calves in a Washington state herd that includes an offspring of the cow diagnosed with mad cow disease. Ron DeHaven, the Agriculture Department's chief veterinarian, said Monday that the month-old calves would be slaughtered this week at an undisclosed facility that is not being used. He also announced that USDA officials would visit Mexico to discuss that country's ban on American beef products following the diagnosis last month of the first U.S. case of mad cow disease. Mexico is one of more than 30 countries to halt U.S. beef imports. The herd that is to be destroyed is one of three under quarantine in Washington because of ties to the diseased Holstein. The other herds contain cows that probably are from the same Alberta farm as the 6-year-old Holstein, but DNA tests to confirm the cow's origins are not complete. Officials decided to kill all month-old calves in the Sunnyside, Wash., herd because they cannot determine which one was born to the infected cow. While officials have said contaminated feed is the most likely source of infection, they cannot rule out transmission of the disease from mother to calf...Sales off for La. cattle farmers Monday Louisiana cattle prices were off slightly but volume was down substantially in the state's first auctions since last month's mad cow scare, the state Department of Agriculture and Forestry reported Monday. Louisiana's cattle industry shuts down during the two weeks of Christmas and New Year's. The first cattle sales scheduled in Louisiana since the mad cow announcement were held Monday throughout the state, and the number of cattle sold was a fraction of pre-announcement totals. In West Monroe the drop was from around 600 to about 200, in Baton Rouge the number went from 400 to 100, and in Kinder the drop was from 1000 to around 170 head of cattle. By contrast, however, prices were comparatively stable, according to the agriculture department. Cows for slaughter were only off by a few dollars per hundred pounds, and feeder cattle were off by about five dollars...Number of cattle at West Texas auction down significantly The number of cattle for sale at Tulia's livestock auction was down about 70 percent from normal Monday as few producers wanted to be the first to sell their stock since mad cow disease was found in the United States. Rather than buying, many who attended came to see what the prices were like at the Tulia Livestock Auction. "It's hurt the pocketbook," auction manager Mark Hargrave. "The cattle industry has lost a lot of money." A 615-pound steer brought the highest price at $89.50 per 100 pounds - about $10 less per 100 pounds than what it would have sold for during the last Tulia auction on Dec. 22. "It wasn't near as bad as everybody thought it would be," Hargrave said of the prices. "Everyone was encouraged. It was lower but it wasn't a wreck." Typically, there are about 3,000 cattle at the auction, one of the two largest in the Panhandle region, Hargrave said. About 800 were up for sale Monday...Cattle Farmers Watch Anxiously As Sales Resume Like many cattle farmers, Jeff Riester was an anxious spectator Monday as cattle sales resumed at Blue Grass Stockyards in Lexington for the first time since the mad cow disease scare. Riester and others expressed relief as prices fell only slightly during light sales at the Lexington stockyard. Other cattle markets will reopen in Kentucky this week after the long holiday break. Kentucky is the leading beef cattle producer east of the Mississippi River. Prices on Monday dropped, on average, by $5 to $10 per hundredweight from the last sales in December, said David Holt, assistant manager at the Lexington stockyard. Some cattle producers had braced for the possibility that prices would fall by $25 to $30 per hundredweight, he said. "It's a very light volume today because everybody was nervous about what was going to happen," Holt said. "We've had a crowd of farmers sitting and watching. But now the talk is very positive." The Lexington stockyard typically sells 2,500 to 3,000 cattle on the first sales day of the new year, Holt said. On Monday, only 350 cattle went on the auction block...Economist sees $70 cattle in first quarter, upper $60s later "Where do prices go from here?" That's the question on every cattle producer's mind at this point, says Darrell Mark, University of Nebraska ag economist. Barring decreases in domestic consumer demand and assuming no additional mad cow cases are found in the US, fed cattle prices are likely to trade in the mid- to upper-$70s during the first quarter of 2004, he says. That's the low end of normal, says another ag economist."The loss of US beef exports represents about 10% of US production," Purdue ag economist Chris Hurt said in a release December 24. "If all other factors remain the same, we would look for a 12% to 16% drop in cattle prices. This probably adds up to a $2 billion hit to the beef industry at the farm level in 2004...Japan looks at taking more NZ beef A delegation of Japanese officials is to arrive on Monday to discuss increasing New Zealand beef exports to Japan in the wake of a case of madcow disease in the United States. A Meat New Zealand spokeswoman said the delegation included three Japanese officials, from the equivalent of New Zealand's Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF). The group was also to speak to Australian officials about its beef trade with Japan. "What they are going to do is talk about supply, because Japan has said it won't take beef from the US now," she said...Cattlemen, feedlots stock up in hope of more sales to Japan Australian cattleman Scott de Bruin plans to raise 20 per cent more cattle this year, betting a ban on US beef means higher sales to Japan and South Korea. The two Asian nations are among more than 30 countries that barred US beef after one case of mad cow disease was found in a Washington state herd. Japan and Korea buy about two-thirds of US beef exports, which totalled as much as $US3.8 billion ($4.97 billion) in 2003. A shortage of the fatty US meat many Japanese prefer means higher prices for graziers like Mr de Bruin, who this year aims to sell 300 Wagyu cattle, the breed producing Japan's Kobe beef. For Australia, the world's biggest beef exporter, US misfortune may reverse a two-year slide in sales as the weakening US dollar made Australian exports more expensive...Mad cow, other brain diseases, mystify scientists For all the worry mad cow disease is generating, it's just one in a family of 10 diseases discovered so far - five in animals, five in humans - that are arguably medicine's most mystifying maladies. Most so-called prion diseases are incredibly rare in this country, although one has spread into deer and elk herds in at least 12 states, sparking concern about contaminated game meat. Yet scientists can't answer the most basic questions about prions, even though learning how the rogue proteins cause sponge-like holes in brains could improve understanding of more common neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's...Japan Critical Of US Safeguards Japan on Monday questioned the effectiveness of U.S. safeguards against bovine spongiform encephalopathy, suggesting Tokyo would hold out for stricter U.S. screening of livestock before lifting an import ban on U.S. beef. Following the discovery of the first U.S. case of BSE, commonly known as mad cow disease, last month, the U.S. announced new restrictions on beef aimed at keeping cow brains, eyes, spinal cords and small intestines and the meat of "downer cows" that can't walk or stand on their own from entering the food supply. But Vice Agriculture Minister Yoshiaki Watanabe indicated U.S. action hasn't quieted concerns in Japan about the safety of American beef. "They are not as effective as steps being taken in Japan," Watanabe told a news conference on Monday. Confused About Mad Cow? New Ad Exposes Scaremongers and Dispels Myths The best science available says, overwhelmingly, that mad cow disease poses near-zero risk to American consumers. Yet activists -- many with hidden political or financial agendas -- continue to promote needless food scare myths in order to frighten consumers. With a new full-page ad on the back cover of this week's national edition of U.S. News & World Report, the Center for Consumer Freedom aims to shatter these myths and reveal America's newest class of scaremongers. At www.ConsumerFreedom.com, readers can learn the latest about the mad-cow scare, get straight answers to Frequently Asked Questions, and see responses to the misinformation promoted by a rogues gallery of mad-cow alarmists including:...
Sunday, January 04, 2004
MAD COW NEWS
Activists take case to meat eaters On Christmas Eve, less than a day after federal officials uncovered the first known case of mad cow disease in the United States, converging streams of animal rights activists, vegans and organic food proponents were already planning ways to capitalize on what they saw as the silver lining of opportunity in the nationwide scare. They had to. After years of waving their arms about the way beef cattle are raised and the health risks associated with eating meat, suddenly the nation was listening; the security of that most American of meals -- the hamburger -- had been threatened...Wash. Schools Weigh Beef Scare Meat chili. That is lunch today in eastern Washington state's Reardan-Edwall School District, where 650 students will return to class. The district is about a 90-minute drive from the Moses Lake plant where a Holstein infected with mad cow disease was slaughtered. News of that first mad cow case in the United States broke Dec. 23, when many of the nation's schools were on break. That means today will be the first time that millions of students return to the school cafeteria, where hamburgers and meat-topped pizza often rule...Mad Cow Forces Beef Industry to Change Course The financial motive that drove the industry to defend practices like selling downers has been turned on its head by the discovery of mad cow disease. Now, in an attempt to rescue the market for American beef, the industry is being forced to accept regulation it has long fought. But some large American companies that process and sell beef had already abandoned those more controversial practices, which had been a rallying point for food safety advocates since mad cow disease appeared overseas nearly two decades ago. While a schism developed in the industry, the current crisis reveals how government regulators sided with companies that adhered to those methods of operation. When an animal rights group, Farm Sanctuary, and an individual, Michael Baur, sued the government to force a ban on using downer animals for food, government lawyers persuaded a federal judge to dismiss the case on the ground that mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, had not appeared in the United States...Mad cow weighs down a $175 billion industry The first weeks of the mad-cow scare in the US are rippling out through the nation's economy. In one way or another - from the tons of pet food made of "meat byproducts" for nearly 140 million cats and dogs, to the $200 million in beef waiting aboard ships and in port freezers, to meat-processing and trucking companies sending workers home - the $175 billion industry affects many millions of Americans. "Beef. It's What's for Dinner," proclaims the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, and American eating habits bear that out. Some 78 million meals featuring beef are served every day, according to industry and government figures, and it's not just the pot roast or filet mignon. Beef extract made from the remains of slaughtered cows is in taco fillings, pizza toppings, and other popular foods as well. Whether or not they're regular red-meat eaters, Americans are watching the situation closely. While two-thirds still think the beef supply is safe, according to a CNN-Time poll released over the weekend, a substantial 27 percent think otherwise, and they have either reduced their consumption of beef or stopped eating it altogether...Mad cow testing pressure mounts, Canadian rules deemed too lax The emergence of a second case of mad cow disease has renewed calls for Canada to dramatically increase testing for the brain-wasting disease in cattle. "This was an accident waiting to happen," said David Westaway, associate professor of microbiology at the University of Toronto. "Up until May of this year, we were screening about 2,700 animals a year." Canadian beef industry officials peg costs at $30 million to $60 million annually to test all animals ready for slaughter in Canada's herd -- something Japan already does. In 2002, about 3.4 million cattle were slaughtered in Canada...Government says feed restrictions are enough to protect consumers, but some leading scientists disagree The more Americans learn about the animal discovered in Washington state with mad cow disease, the more some might wonder what they're eating. The more pertinent question, though, might be: What did the cow eat? Or for that matter, any other farm animal ultimately bound for the dinner table? Should we be concerned about what these animals ate long before we ate them? "There's been a lot of criticism of the firewall, which really isn't a firewall at all," said Jean Halloran, director of the Yonkers, N.Y-based Consumer Policy Institute, a division of Consumers Union. The FDA has "taken half-measures that leave open back doors for the potential transmission of the disease," Halloran said. "They've tried to solve the matter by banning ruminant remains in feed to ruminants, but they allow pigs and chickens to consume feed containing ruminant protein. Then they permit poultry waste, which includes spilled chicken feed, feathers and chicken excreta, to be legally reprocessed into cattle feed." But to people like Gary Pearl, president of the Fats and Protein Research Foundation, a Bloomington, Ill.-based organization that conducts research and development of animal feed, chance has little to do with the matter. He said numerous studies strongly suggest that other farm animal species are not susceptible to BSE-like diseases, and do not transmit them. "There is no scientific evidence that a complete ban would enhance feed safety for other species: swine, poultry, aquaculture, dogs. If a ban does happen, it will be for emotional or political reasons. Science doesn't exist to support the idea."...FDA Faces Pressure for More Action Over Mad Cow The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which has not implemented any new safeguards since the discovery of the first U.S. mad cow case, faces growing pressure to bolster its ban on the use of cattle remains in certain animal feed. The discovery of mad cow disease in a Holstein dairy cow in Washington state has focused new attention on how cattle are raised and slaughtered. While the U.S. Agriculture Department rushed to impose a series of new food safety rules, FDA officials have said it would take time before deciding whether extra precautions were necessary to protect U.S. cattle herds from the brain-wasting disease...Some claim human link to mad cow A biopsy of her brain tissue showed the cause of her death was Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, an extremely rare, fatal disorder whose victims often die within a year. Medical experts insist there is no known link between classic CJD and mad cow disease. McKinley's daughters, Sharron Potts and her sister Debbie Creel-Martin, are convinced the experts are wrong. "The scientists don't really know," Potts, 56, said. "They don't want to talk about it. They are trying to put as little information out there as they can." Florence Kranitz, executive director of the CJD foundation, said lately she gets up to 10 calls a day from people who lost their loved ones to the illness and mistakenly believe it may have been caused by eating beef from cattle with mad cow disease...Fear of mad cow disease takes toll on Shasta Livestock sale Thundering hooves, clanking gates, the drone of the auctioneer and the buzz of friendly conversation all herald a typical weekly sale at the Shasta Livestock Auction Yard. But something was different Friday. It was the first sale since officials confirmed a case of mad cow disease in Washington state -- and everyone with a cowboy hat and an acre of land was talking about it. Only 400 head of cattle were up for sale Friday, compared with 2,000 or more on a normal week with no holiday. Buyers at Friday's auction paid a good deal less. Richard Stober of Fresno bought 40 head of steer for $150 a head less than he might have before the scare. A steer worth $1,400 two months ago might be worth closer to $1,050 if prices fall as expected. "It's a pretty dramatic drop," he said...How Now, Mad Cow? Big Beef was doing fine until disease felled a heifer. Will consumer anxiety cripple the industry? (Time Magazine) For the U.S., could this be the year of mad cow? The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) banned Canadian beef in May after mad-cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), turned up in a single calf there. Now it is America's turn. More than 30 countries have banned U.S. beef imports since BSE was detected in a slaughtered 6-year-old dairy cow in Washington State on Dec. 23. Though officials say the cow entered from Canada in 2001, the USDA last week instituted a series of measures to reassure consumers that American beef is safe, including a ban on the slaughter of cattle too sick or injured to walk, called downers, for human food. The BSE-infected cow was one such downer. The USDA also called for immediate implementation of a national animal-tracking system so the source of any diseased cattle could be more readily identified. As the public copes with the news, the U.S.'s $40 billion cattle business is bracing for trouble. The industry, led by the National Cattlemen's Beef Association in Denver, had originally fought the ban on downers as costly and unnecessary. But the losses caused by the BSE discovery in Washington State are likely to make those steps seem cheap by comparison. Big overseas customers like Japan and South Korea no longer want U.S. steaks; ships at sea packed with meat bound for Asia are turning back. Containers of frozen French fries cooked in beef tallow for the export market are idling in U.S. ports. In short, America's $4.3 billion beef-export business is pretty much dead meat, at least for now...Soup bones linked to 'mad cow' found in area, 7 Santa Clara County Restaurants Notified Seven restaurants in Santa Clara County received soup bones from a shipment of Washington state beef that has been recalled because it was believed to include parts of a cow that tested positive for "mad cow'' disease, a county official said Saturday. The risk of disease for anyone who ate food made from the soup bones is "extremely low'' because the products are not from the animal's spine, brain or small intestines, where the contamination is found, said Marty Fenstersheib, health officer for the Santa Clara County public-health department...Cattle feeding habits get new scrutiny Sixty-three companies -- including a rendering corporation with a Boise plant and a North Idaho feed mill -- have been warned about violating a ban put in place in 1997 to protect U.S. cattle from mad cow disease. The warnings, found in an examination of U.S. Food and Drug Administration records, show that while the risk of a mad cow outbreak remains small in this country, the threat remains. The FDA ban is intended to keep cattle from eating feed that contains beef byproducts, the practice Canadian officials believe may have led to the first U.S. case of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, last month...Lessons of mad cow scare, Consumers looking more at safety of food supply Every few years America gets a harsh wakeup call about the food supply. In the 1980s, it was the pesticide Alar contaminating apples. In the 1990s, it was genetically modified corn killing monarch butterfly larvae and E. coli tainting fast-food hamburgers. Now, the topic is mad cow disease. A squeamish nation has gotten a crash course in slaughtering methods, spinal cords and "downer cows" -- animals too sick to walk but, until last week's ban by Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman, considered safe enough to end up as hamburger or lunchmeat. Usually, after the shock of the realities of industrial food production wears off and government agencies promise policy shifts, everyone goes back to the supermarket and the incident becomes old news. But this time, things might be different...Column: 'Mad Cow' Legislation Comes Down to Economics Now that even the Texans in the White House have come around to banning the slaughter of diseased cattle, it looks like it took a congressman who hails from Queens to give the ranchers and dairy farmers a lesson in agricultural economics. In the decade before the crisis hit, Rep. Gary Ackerman, a Democrat whose district boasts a total herd of six head at the zoo in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, railed against the short- sightedness and greed of ranchers and dairy farmers for opposing such a ban on the sale of "downer" livestock, so sick or injured they had to be dragged to the killing floor. Ackerman warned that the animals posed a public health risk because cows infected with Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy in Canada and Britain were downers. Fast food chains like Wendy's, Burger King and McDonald's already didn't accept the meat, and the government barred it from the school lunch program...Mad cow scare hits home Richard Nielson of Ephraim, a cattle feeder with more than 3,000 beef cattle in feedlots in Utah and the Midwest, saw the value of his cattle holdings slashed in half since the first case of mad cow disease was discovered in the United States on Dec. 23. Prices of cattle for delivery through April, which hit all-time record highs last year because of strong demand and the popularity of protein-rich diets -- have fallen dramatically on concerns over beef consumption and prospects of a domestic supply glut resulting from import bans on U.S. beef by at least 36 countries. The United States exports about 10 percent of its annual cattle production -- a $6 billion-a-year business. Nielson is among the many shell-shocked cattle feeders and ranchers nationwide who spent the holidays keenly monitoring cattle prices on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange for an indication of where the bottom may be...Perilous politics, A summer election in Japan may spell disaster for Canadian beef Japanese politics could keep the U.S. border ban on Canadian live cattle in place into the fall, according to a Washington, D.C., think-tank. Mindy Kotler, an analyst with the Washington-based Japan Information Access Project, said she expects Tokyo to exploit the U.S. mad cow case for political gain - by maintaining a ban on American beef imports until after the summer. "The Japanese have an election coming up by the end of July for the upper house," she said. "Rural votes are a major constituency in Japan, and the agriculture lobby is very, very powerful. "U.S. beef exports to Japan are worth $1 billion a year. The Japanese government knows it can win votes by blocking foreign beef - they did it to Canada last year, and now they're doing it to us. The Japanese government couldn't have asked for a better political gift going into an election."...Mad cow politics feared A farmers' marketing group in the U.S. is pressuring its government to declare itself "provisionally BSE free," if an American infected cow is found to have come from Canada. While the move would point the finger for at Canada -- and specifically a northern Alberta renderer -- officials here are optimistic the Americans will rely on science and re-open their borders to our beef. But, "the unknown is if politics comes into play," said Gary Sargent, executive director of Alberta Beef Producers. "They've been talking all along of using good science." He said under the international animal health organization's guidelines, Canada would be allowed one infected cow per million, or up to 10 infected cows to still be considered low-risk for BSE. The Organization for Competitive Markets, which represents small farmers, is asking the U.S. government to declare itself "provisionally free" of mad cow if the animal is found to have come from Alberta, which would allow its export markets to stay open...Column: USDA politics rile meatpacker on a mission John Munsell tried to warn them. He documented the dangerous practices of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's meat inspection program. He took the evidence to the agency, telling them that deadly pathogens were in the meat supply. The response? They tried to shut him down. As concerns about mad cow disease spread, Munsell's story offers a case study in how a federal agency charged with protecting the food supply has been hijacked by the corporate giants it's supposed to regulate...Editorial: Economics drives industry reforms The U.S. Department of Agriculture will decide soon how many Washington state herds will be destroyed because of exposure to mad cow disease. "It would be safe to assume that ... some or all of those animals will need to be sacrificed," said Dr. Ron DeHaven, the department's chief veterinarian. At least three herds are at risk, he said, but other cows may be "sacrificed" as well. Destroying animals with even the potential of carrying the mad cow proteins is important step to reassure the public that its food supply is safe. The destruction of cattle is much more about perception than it is to combat the disease. The government wants to react swiftly to show the public it knows what to do. Yet so far the government's reaction raises more questions than answers. A column today on the cover of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Focus section says the U.S. Department of Agriculture is more worried about the prosperity of the beef industry than it is in substantive reform. Instead of learning from other nations' experiences with mad cow disease, the United States is repeating their mistakes, says author Eric Schlosser... Scientists Weigh Risks of Beef The repeated assertion by government officials that American beef is safe to eat -- despite the discovery of the first U.S. case of mad cow disease -- is based in large part on painstakingly acquired evidence that pure muscle from mad cows simply does not contain enough of the strange infectious material to give the disease to a human being. Muscle meat contaminated with brain or spinal tissue from infected cows is another matter. Eating it can be deadly. Scientists believe that is how about 150 people worldwide have contracted the human version of mad cow disease, which first appeared in Britain in 1996. But muscle meat alone -- beef, in short -- appears safe. The evidence for this is strong and convincing. But as with all assessment of biological risk, it is not absolute and unqualified. "I'd like to say for sure that muscle is safe. I'm reasonably sure that muscle is safe. But like everything else in science, the answer is incomplete," said Paul Brown, a physician and neuroscientist at the National Institutes of Health. He is a leading authority on bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), the formal name of mad cow disease...Editorial: Crack down on ranchers To those in the know, mad cow disease in the United States is not surprising. Current animal feed and food processing practices virtually guarantee that brain matter from sick cattle and other animals finds its way into everything from hot dogs to ground meat and sausage. Rural America's farm-based economy is already teetering on collapse, so it is unrealistic either to expect producers to pick up the tab or alert authorities to unfit animals. Only stricter oversights balanced with fair compensation will keep dairies, ranches and farms from selling diseased carcasses and unfit meat to food processors...Organic meat coalition's sales up after mad cow announcement An organic meat coalition's sales have boomed since a case of mad cow disease was discovered in the United States last month, its founder says. "We've seen a big rise in business," said Wende Elliott, president of the Colo-based Wholesomeharvest.com organic meat coalition. "It only makes sense. (The regulations) that people in commodity beef are concerned about right now are already in place in our production." Elliott founded Wholesomeharvest.com in 2001 with her husband, Joe Rude. The coalition -- which sells beef, chicken, lamb, turkey, duck and goose -- has 41 small farm members in four states. Elliott said there's no fear over mad cow disease with the Wholesomeharvest.com products because the organically raised animals are never fed animal byproducts, which she said is a suspected source of mad cow disease...BSE safeguards failed; now what? The U.S. Department of Agriculture has erred in treating mad cow disease as a public relations problem. Its response smacks of damage control, not problem solving. Officials say the U.S. food supply is as safe as ever. With the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimating some 70 million cases of food poisoning last year, we're not sure that's a good thing. Safety in food remains a relative thing. In any case, it's a little beside the point. The late-December discovery that a sick cow butchered in Washington suffered from bovine spongiform encephalopathy, better known as mad cow disease, is an event worthy of great note. But not necessarily for the reason most people think. It's not because the whole U.S. meat supply is suspect. At least, there's no reason yet to believe it is. Rather, what we learn from this one mad cow is that measures that the government and beef industry believed were sufficient to keep the United States free of this disease are demonstrably inadequate. That's the issue - the inadequacy of safeguards...Column: A Bum Steer On Mad Cow Disease (Business Week) Other countries do much more to protect their citizens. In Japan, all cattle slaughtered for food, and, in Europe, all such cattle age 30 months and older, are tested for BSE -- costing just a few cents per pound. That compares with just 20,000 cattle tested in the U.S., or less than 0.001% of the 36 million animals slaughtered here each year. Now the cattle industry's successful lobbying is coming back to haunt it. Health issues, of course, remain paramount, but there's big money at risk here, too. Upon the discovery of the sick U.S. cow, 30 countries banned imports of American beef, including Japan, Australia, and Mexico. Those bans of U.S. beef exports could cost the economy $2 billion in 2004, estimates Chris Hurt, a Purdue University agricultural economist. Despite the USDA's reassurances, many food-safety experts fear that the ban on feeding bovine by-products to other cows won't actually protect America from mad cow disease. That's because it has some gaping loopholes. First, the ban doesn't outlaw the feeding of cow's blood to other cows. Beef farmers often feed dried cattle blood to calves as a supplement to promote faster weight gain. Some experts worry that could spread BSE...Forum Puts Mad Cow In Perspective, Veterinarian Reminds Attendees That Disease Is Non-Contagious Before Americans overreact to the recent discovery of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) or "Mad Cow" in an American dairy cow, Sam Holland, DVM, South Dakota's state veterinarian, said it is important to put the ordeal into perspective. Holland was the keynote speaker at the ninth annual Midwest Farm Policy Forum Saturday at JD's Event Center, north of Yankton. "This is a non-contagious disease. It does not pass from animal to animal," Holland said. "It is contracted by animals who consume ruminant feed products." Holland said the practice of feeding ruminant blood and bone meal to cattle was banned in the U.S. in 1997. "Because the incubation period is three to eight years, it is possible to see cattle with BSE, but we are six years out and as we get closer to eight to 10 years out there is less chance we will find that disease."...Cattle sale barns resume auctions Some Kansas cattle auctions were canceled last week as prices fell in response to the discovery of mad cow disease in a Washington state Holstein, but sellers said they planned to hold auctions this week. Delaine Rezac said no one complained last week about his canceling his auction at the Rezac Livestock Commission Co., normally held Tuesdays in St. Marys, about 30 miles northwest of Topeka. By Tuesday, feeder cattle had fallen about $15 per hundredweight. With no clear sign of where cattle prices on the futures market would bottom out, Rezac said it would have been unfair to sellers and buyers to hold the auction...
Activists take case to meat eaters On Christmas Eve, less than a day after federal officials uncovered the first known case of mad cow disease in the United States, converging streams of animal rights activists, vegans and organic food proponents were already planning ways to capitalize on what they saw as the silver lining of opportunity in the nationwide scare. They had to. After years of waving their arms about the way beef cattle are raised and the health risks associated with eating meat, suddenly the nation was listening; the security of that most American of meals -- the hamburger -- had been threatened...Wash. Schools Weigh Beef Scare Meat chili. That is lunch today in eastern Washington state's Reardan-Edwall School District, where 650 students will return to class. The district is about a 90-minute drive from the Moses Lake plant where a Holstein infected with mad cow disease was slaughtered. News of that first mad cow case in the United States broke Dec. 23, when many of the nation's schools were on break. That means today will be the first time that millions of students return to the school cafeteria, where hamburgers and meat-topped pizza often rule...Mad Cow Forces Beef Industry to Change Course The financial motive that drove the industry to defend practices like selling downers has been turned on its head by the discovery of mad cow disease. Now, in an attempt to rescue the market for American beef, the industry is being forced to accept regulation it has long fought. But some large American companies that process and sell beef had already abandoned those more controversial practices, which had been a rallying point for food safety advocates since mad cow disease appeared overseas nearly two decades ago. While a schism developed in the industry, the current crisis reveals how government regulators sided with companies that adhered to those methods of operation. When an animal rights group, Farm Sanctuary, and an individual, Michael Baur, sued the government to force a ban on using downer animals for food, government lawyers persuaded a federal judge to dismiss the case on the ground that mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, had not appeared in the United States...Mad cow weighs down a $175 billion industry The first weeks of the mad-cow scare in the US are rippling out through the nation's economy. In one way or another - from the tons of pet food made of "meat byproducts" for nearly 140 million cats and dogs, to the $200 million in beef waiting aboard ships and in port freezers, to meat-processing and trucking companies sending workers home - the $175 billion industry affects many millions of Americans. "Beef. It's What's for Dinner," proclaims the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, and American eating habits bear that out. Some 78 million meals featuring beef are served every day, according to industry and government figures, and it's not just the pot roast or filet mignon. Beef extract made from the remains of slaughtered cows is in taco fillings, pizza toppings, and other popular foods as well. Whether or not they're regular red-meat eaters, Americans are watching the situation closely. While two-thirds still think the beef supply is safe, according to a CNN-Time poll released over the weekend, a substantial 27 percent think otherwise, and they have either reduced their consumption of beef or stopped eating it altogether...Mad cow testing pressure mounts, Canadian rules deemed too lax The emergence of a second case of mad cow disease has renewed calls for Canada to dramatically increase testing for the brain-wasting disease in cattle. "This was an accident waiting to happen," said David Westaway, associate professor of microbiology at the University of Toronto. "Up until May of this year, we were screening about 2,700 animals a year." Canadian beef industry officials peg costs at $30 million to $60 million annually to test all animals ready for slaughter in Canada's herd -- something Japan already does. In 2002, about 3.4 million cattle were slaughtered in Canada...Government says feed restrictions are enough to protect consumers, but some leading scientists disagree The more Americans learn about the animal discovered in Washington state with mad cow disease, the more some might wonder what they're eating. The more pertinent question, though, might be: What did the cow eat? Or for that matter, any other farm animal ultimately bound for the dinner table? Should we be concerned about what these animals ate long before we ate them? "There's been a lot of criticism of the firewall, which really isn't a firewall at all," said Jean Halloran, director of the Yonkers, N.Y-based Consumer Policy Institute, a division of Consumers Union. The FDA has "taken half-measures that leave open back doors for the potential transmission of the disease," Halloran said. "They've tried to solve the matter by banning ruminant remains in feed to ruminants, but they allow pigs and chickens to consume feed containing ruminant protein. Then they permit poultry waste, which includes spilled chicken feed, feathers and chicken excreta, to be legally reprocessed into cattle feed." But to people like Gary Pearl, president of the Fats and Protein Research Foundation, a Bloomington, Ill.-based organization that conducts research and development of animal feed, chance has little to do with the matter. He said numerous studies strongly suggest that other farm animal species are not susceptible to BSE-like diseases, and do not transmit them. "There is no scientific evidence that a complete ban would enhance feed safety for other species: swine, poultry, aquaculture, dogs. If a ban does happen, it will be for emotional or political reasons. Science doesn't exist to support the idea."...FDA Faces Pressure for More Action Over Mad Cow The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which has not implemented any new safeguards since the discovery of the first U.S. mad cow case, faces growing pressure to bolster its ban on the use of cattle remains in certain animal feed. The discovery of mad cow disease in a Holstein dairy cow in Washington state has focused new attention on how cattle are raised and slaughtered. While the U.S. Agriculture Department rushed to impose a series of new food safety rules, FDA officials have said it would take time before deciding whether extra precautions were necessary to protect U.S. cattle herds from the brain-wasting disease...Some claim human link to mad cow A biopsy of her brain tissue showed the cause of her death was Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, an extremely rare, fatal disorder whose victims often die within a year. Medical experts insist there is no known link between classic CJD and mad cow disease. McKinley's daughters, Sharron Potts and her sister Debbie Creel-Martin, are convinced the experts are wrong. "The scientists don't really know," Potts, 56, said. "They don't want to talk about it. They are trying to put as little information out there as they can." Florence Kranitz, executive director of the CJD foundation, said lately she gets up to 10 calls a day from people who lost their loved ones to the illness and mistakenly believe it may have been caused by eating beef from cattle with mad cow disease...Fear of mad cow disease takes toll on Shasta Livestock sale Thundering hooves, clanking gates, the drone of the auctioneer and the buzz of friendly conversation all herald a typical weekly sale at the Shasta Livestock Auction Yard. But something was different Friday. It was the first sale since officials confirmed a case of mad cow disease in Washington state -- and everyone with a cowboy hat and an acre of land was talking about it. Only 400 head of cattle were up for sale Friday, compared with 2,000 or more on a normal week with no holiday. Buyers at Friday's auction paid a good deal less. Richard Stober of Fresno bought 40 head of steer for $150 a head less than he might have before the scare. A steer worth $1,400 two months ago might be worth closer to $1,050 if prices fall as expected. "It's a pretty dramatic drop," he said...How Now, Mad Cow? Big Beef was doing fine until disease felled a heifer. Will consumer anxiety cripple the industry? (Time Magazine) For the U.S., could this be the year of mad cow? The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) banned Canadian beef in May after mad-cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), turned up in a single calf there. Now it is America's turn. More than 30 countries have banned U.S. beef imports since BSE was detected in a slaughtered 6-year-old dairy cow in Washington State on Dec. 23. Though officials say the cow entered from Canada in 2001, the USDA last week instituted a series of measures to reassure consumers that American beef is safe, including a ban on the slaughter of cattle too sick or injured to walk, called downers, for human food. The BSE-infected cow was one such downer. The USDA also called for immediate implementation of a national animal-tracking system so the source of any diseased cattle could be more readily identified. As the public copes with the news, the U.S.'s $40 billion cattle business is bracing for trouble. The industry, led by the National Cattlemen's Beef Association in Denver, had originally fought the ban on downers as costly and unnecessary. But the losses caused by the BSE discovery in Washington State are likely to make those steps seem cheap by comparison. Big overseas customers like Japan and South Korea no longer want U.S. steaks; ships at sea packed with meat bound for Asia are turning back. Containers of frozen French fries cooked in beef tallow for the export market are idling in U.S. ports. In short, America's $4.3 billion beef-export business is pretty much dead meat, at least for now...Soup bones linked to 'mad cow' found in area, 7 Santa Clara County Restaurants Notified Seven restaurants in Santa Clara County received soup bones from a shipment of Washington state beef that has been recalled because it was believed to include parts of a cow that tested positive for "mad cow'' disease, a county official said Saturday. The risk of disease for anyone who ate food made from the soup bones is "extremely low'' because the products are not from the animal's spine, brain or small intestines, where the contamination is found, said Marty Fenstersheib, health officer for the Santa Clara County public-health department...Cattle feeding habits get new scrutiny Sixty-three companies -- including a rendering corporation with a Boise plant and a North Idaho feed mill -- have been warned about violating a ban put in place in 1997 to protect U.S. cattle from mad cow disease. The warnings, found in an examination of U.S. Food and Drug Administration records, show that while the risk of a mad cow outbreak remains small in this country, the threat remains. The FDA ban is intended to keep cattle from eating feed that contains beef byproducts, the practice Canadian officials believe may have led to the first U.S. case of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, last month...Lessons of mad cow scare, Consumers looking more at safety of food supply Every few years America gets a harsh wakeup call about the food supply. In the 1980s, it was the pesticide Alar contaminating apples. In the 1990s, it was genetically modified corn killing monarch butterfly larvae and E. coli tainting fast-food hamburgers. Now, the topic is mad cow disease. A squeamish nation has gotten a crash course in slaughtering methods, spinal cords and "downer cows" -- animals too sick to walk but, until last week's ban by Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman, considered safe enough to end up as hamburger or lunchmeat. Usually, after the shock of the realities of industrial food production wears off and government agencies promise policy shifts, everyone goes back to the supermarket and the incident becomes old news. But this time, things might be different...Column: 'Mad Cow' Legislation Comes Down to Economics Now that even the Texans in the White House have come around to banning the slaughter of diseased cattle, it looks like it took a congressman who hails from Queens to give the ranchers and dairy farmers a lesson in agricultural economics. In the decade before the crisis hit, Rep. Gary Ackerman, a Democrat whose district boasts a total herd of six head at the zoo in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, railed against the short- sightedness and greed of ranchers and dairy farmers for opposing such a ban on the sale of "downer" livestock, so sick or injured they had to be dragged to the killing floor. Ackerman warned that the animals posed a public health risk because cows infected with Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy in Canada and Britain were downers. Fast food chains like Wendy's, Burger King and McDonald's already didn't accept the meat, and the government barred it from the school lunch program...Mad cow scare hits home Richard Nielson of Ephraim, a cattle feeder with more than 3,000 beef cattle in feedlots in Utah and the Midwest, saw the value of his cattle holdings slashed in half since the first case of mad cow disease was discovered in the United States on Dec. 23. Prices of cattle for delivery through April, which hit all-time record highs last year because of strong demand and the popularity of protein-rich diets -- have fallen dramatically on concerns over beef consumption and prospects of a domestic supply glut resulting from import bans on U.S. beef by at least 36 countries. The United States exports about 10 percent of its annual cattle production -- a $6 billion-a-year business. Nielson is among the many shell-shocked cattle feeders and ranchers nationwide who spent the holidays keenly monitoring cattle prices on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange for an indication of where the bottom may be...Perilous politics, A summer election in Japan may spell disaster for Canadian beef Japanese politics could keep the U.S. border ban on Canadian live cattle in place into the fall, according to a Washington, D.C., think-tank. Mindy Kotler, an analyst with the Washington-based Japan Information Access Project, said she expects Tokyo to exploit the U.S. mad cow case for political gain - by maintaining a ban on American beef imports until after the summer. "The Japanese have an election coming up by the end of July for the upper house," she said. "Rural votes are a major constituency in Japan, and the agriculture lobby is very, very powerful. "U.S. beef exports to Japan are worth $1 billion a year. The Japanese government knows it can win votes by blocking foreign beef - they did it to Canada last year, and now they're doing it to us. The Japanese government couldn't have asked for a better political gift going into an election."...Mad cow politics feared A farmers' marketing group in the U.S. is pressuring its government to declare itself "provisionally BSE free," if an American infected cow is found to have come from Canada. While the move would point the finger for at Canada -- and specifically a northern Alberta renderer -- officials here are optimistic the Americans will rely on science and re-open their borders to our beef. But, "the unknown is if politics comes into play," said Gary Sargent, executive director of Alberta Beef Producers. "They've been talking all along of using good science." He said under the international animal health organization's guidelines, Canada would be allowed one infected cow per million, or up to 10 infected cows to still be considered low-risk for BSE. The Organization for Competitive Markets, which represents small farmers, is asking the U.S. government to declare itself "provisionally free" of mad cow if the animal is found to have come from Alberta, which would allow its export markets to stay open...Column: USDA politics rile meatpacker on a mission John Munsell tried to warn them. He documented the dangerous practices of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's meat inspection program. He took the evidence to the agency, telling them that deadly pathogens were in the meat supply. The response? They tried to shut him down. As concerns about mad cow disease spread, Munsell's story offers a case study in how a federal agency charged with protecting the food supply has been hijacked by the corporate giants it's supposed to regulate...Editorial: Economics drives industry reforms The U.S. Department of Agriculture will decide soon how many Washington state herds will be destroyed because of exposure to mad cow disease. "It would be safe to assume that ... some or all of those animals will need to be sacrificed," said Dr. Ron DeHaven, the department's chief veterinarian. At least three herds are at risk, he said, but other cows may be "sacrificed" as well. Destroying animals with even the potential of carrying the mad cow proteins is important step to reassure the public that its food supply is safe. The destruction of cattle is much more about perception than it is to combat the disease. The government wants to react swiftly to show the public it knows what to do. Yet so far the government's reaction raises more questions than answers. A column today on the cover of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Focus section says the U.S. Department of Agriculture is more worried about the prosperity of the beef industry than it is in substantive reform. Instead of learning from other nations' experiences with mad cow disease, the United States is repeating their mistakes, says author Eric Schlosser... Scientists Weigh Risks of Beef The repeated assertion by government officials that American beef is safe to eat -- despite the discovery of the first U.S. case of mad cow disease -- is based in large part on painstakingly acquired evidence that pure muscle from mad cows simply does not contain enough of the strange infectious material to give the disease to a human being. Muscle meat contaminated with brain or spinal tissue from infected cows is another matter. Eating it can be deadly. Scientists believe that is how about 150 people worldwide have contracted the human version of mad cow disease, which first appeared in Britain in 1996. But muscle meat alone -- beef, in short -- appears safe. The evidence for this is strong and convincing. But as with all assessment of biological risk, it is not absolute and unqualified. "I'd like to say for sure that muscle is safe. I'm reasonably sure that muscle is safe. But like everything else in science, the answer is incomplete," said Paul Brown, a physician and neuroscientist at the National Institutes of Health. He is a leading authority on bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), the formal name of mad cow disease...Editorial: Crack down on ranchers To those in the know, mad cow disease in the United States is not surprising. Current animal feed and food processing practices virtually guarantee that brain matter from sick cattle and other animals finds its way into everything from hot dogs to ground meat and sausage. Rural America's farm-based economy is already teetering on collapse, so it is unrealistic either to expect producers to pick up the tab or alert authorities to unfit animals. Only stricter oversights balanced with fair compensation will keep dairies, ranches and farms from selling diseased carcasses and unfit meat to food processors...Organic meat coalition's sales up after mad cow announcement An organic meat coalition's sales have boomed since a case of mad cow disease was discovered in the United States last month, its founder says. "We've seen a big rise in business," said Wende Elliott, president of the Colo-based Wholesomeharvest.com organic meat coalition. "It only makes sense. (The regulations) that people in commodity beef are concerned about right now are already in place in our production." Elliott founded Wholesomeharvest.com in 2001 with her husband, Joe Rude. The coalition -- which sells beef, chicken, lamb, turkey, duck and goose -- has 41 small farm members in four states. Elliott said there's no fear over mad cow disease with the Wholesomeharvest.com products because the organically raised animals are never fed animal byproducts, which she said is a suspected source of mad cow disease...BSE safeguards failed; now what? The U.S. Department of Agriculture has erred in treating mad cow disease as a public relations problem. Its response smacks of damage control, not problem solving. Officials say the U.S. food supply is as safe as ever. With the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimating some 70 million cases of food poisoning last year, we're not sure that's a good thing. Safety in food remains a relative thing. In any case, it's a little beside the point. The late-December discovery that a sick cow butchered in Washington suffered from bovine spongiform encephalopathy, better known as mad cow disease, is an event worthy of great note. But not necessarily for the reason most people think. It's not because the whole U.S. meat supply is suspect. At least, there's no reason yet to believe it is. Rather, what we learn from this one mad cow is that measures that the government and beef industry believed were sufficient to keep the United States free of this disease are demonstrably inadequate. That's the issue - the inadequacy of safeguards...Column: A Bum Steer On Mad Cow Disease (Business Week) Other countries do much more to protect their citizens. In Japan, all cattle slaughtered for food, and, in Europe, all such cattle age 30 months and older, are tested for BSE -- costing just a few cents per pound. That compares with just 20,000 cattle tested in the U.S., or less than 0.001% of the 36 million animals slaughtered here each year. Now the cattle industry's successful lobbying is coming back to haunt it. Health issues, of course, remain paramount, but there's big money at risk here, too. Upon the discovery of the sick U.S. cow, 30 countries banned imports of American beef, including Japan, Australia, and Mexico. Those bans of U.S. beef exports could cost the economy $2 billion in 2004, estimates Chris Hurt, a Purdue University agricultural economist. Despite the USDA's reassurances, many food-safety experts fear that the ban on feeding bovine by-products to other cows won't actually protect America from mad cow disease. That's because it has some gaping loopholes. First, the ban doesn't outlaw the feeding of cow's blood to other cows. Beef farmers often feed dried cattle blood to calves as a supplement to promote faster weight gain. Some experts worry that could spread BSE...Forum Puts Mad Cow In Perspective, Veterinarian Reminds Attendees That Disease Is Non-Contagious Before Americans overreact to the recent discovery of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) or "Mad Cow" in an American dairy cow, Sam Holland, DVM, South Dakota's state veterinarian, said it is important to put the ordeal into perspective. Holland was the keynote speaker at the ninth annual Midwest Farm Policy Forum Saturday at JD's Event Center, north of Yankton. "This is a non-contagious disease. It does not pass from animal to animal," Holland said. "It is contracted by animals who consume ruminant feed products." Holland said the practice of feeding ruminant blood and bone meal to cattle was banned in the U.S. in 1997. "Because the incubation period is three to eight years, it is possible to see cattle with BSE, but we are six years out and as we get closer to eight to 10 years out there is less chance we will find that disease."...Cattle sale barns resume auctions Some Kansas cattle auctions were canceled last week as prices fell in response to the discovery of mad cow disease in a Washington state Holstein, but sellers said they planned to hold auctions this week. Delaine Rezac said no one complained last week about his canceling his auction at the Rezac Livestock Commission Co., normally held Tuesdays in St. Marys, about 30 miles northwest of Topeka. By Tuesday, feeder cattle had fallen about $15 per hundredweight. With no clear sign of where cattle prices on the futures market would bottom out, Rezac said it would have been unfair to sellers and buyers to hold the auction...
Saturday, January 03, 2004
NEWS ROUNDUP
Private help comes to public land The U.S. Forest Service once managed and paid the bills for everything concerning the national forests, from timber sales to firefighting to campground and trail maintenance. But increasingly, nonprofit, community-based forestry groups are stepping forward to provide some of those services, using federal dollars from grant programs and private money from foundations and individuals to hire independent contractors. During the past decade, the community-based groups have sprouted in Oregon and throughout the West. They've filled a gap caused by Forest Service budget cuts that followed a decline in timber revenue after logging on national forests was sharply curtailed in the 1990s...Conflict looms over timber It's a new year and new battles are on the horizon between environmentalists and the Bush administration over federal forests in the Pacific Northwest -- but the theme is continuing conflict. Central to the clash are changes the Bush administration is making this year in the Northwest Forest Plan, the document hammered out under President Clinton in 1994 to end the standoff over logging federal old-growth forests. Government officials are expected this month and next to finalize rule changes that will make it easier to carry out timber sales without explicitly protecting salmon, and without extensive surveys to discover whether logging would endanger more than 300 hard-to-find slugs, snails, lichens and other species. Later in the year, officials are expected to finalize reviews of whether the spotted owl and another rare bird, the marbled murrelet, should continue to be protected under the Endangered Species Act...Forest plan a regulatory war There is one thing Colorado's two giant ski resort competitors agree on: the revised White River Forest Plan adopted in 2002 has some provisions that need to be changed. That new plan restricts both the acreage available for ski area expansion and imposes stricter clean water standards for ski areas. Both provisions are being appealed by Vail Resorts, Intrawest and Colorado Ski Country USA, an industry advocacy group... Oil rigs help biologists unlock mystery of ocean life From his office in downtown New Orleans, Dan Allen can see to the bottom of the ocean. Allen, a marine biologist with Chevron Texaco, studies the ocean's depths using images from the remote-controlled vehicles that fix oil pipelines and wells on the sea floor as well as the eyes of hundreds of workers manning offshore platforms. "We just recently discovered a very large shark in the Gulf of Mexico in about 10,000 feet of water. It was the first ever observed in the Gulf," Allen said. "We want to get feedback from people offshore as to what they are seeing when and where." For land-bound academics and the hardcore biologists working for major corporations, oil exploration has become a surrogate for scientific research unlike ever before...Soar subject The 3-month-old bald eaglets huddled like two scared kids while a gaggle of photographers surrounded them at the Barr Lake gazebo. Division of Wildlife raptor expert Jerry Craig had snatched them out of their nest at the edge of the lake and boated to the gazebo so spectators could watch as he weighed the eaglets, drew blood from them and crimped bands on their legs...Bear advocate an enigma in death Timothy Treadwell's death came just the way he had predicted. Treadwell and his girlfriend were mauled by a 1,000-pound grizzly bear last October in a remote section of Alaskan wilderness that Treadwell knew well after years of living among its bear population. He had started an environmental group and received donations from celebrities such as actor Leonardo DiCaprio, in part by saying the bears he loved were in jeopardy. He spun colorful stories about his adventures for the Discovery Channel, David Letterman's late-night audience and the Walt Disney Co. What few knew about Treadwell was that much of his life was an invention...Salton Sea's mud delays dike plan Scientists have uncovered a distressing secret about the lakebed of the Salton Sea: Portions of it are covered with a 50-foot-thick layer of silt the consistency of peanut butter. That revelation is particularly troubling for California's largest lake, a place of promise and despair that has endured three decades of scientific study and political haggling. The latest findings place in jeopardy a proposal by state and federal agencies to build an 81/2-mile dike across the desolate and smelly lake to stave off ecological disaster. Salton Sea Authority officials say the costs of that plan could increase 200 percent, to $3 billion...Lockheed sells rocket test site near Beaumont as preserve Behind a padlocked gate sits thousands of acres filled with stands of cottonwoods and willows, a gentle stream, big granite boulders and abundant wildlife, including deer, bobcat and quail. It's also a spot where aerospace giant Lockheed tested rocket engines for America's space program at the height of the Cold War. On Friday, government agencies and environmentalists announced a $25.5 million land deal for about 9,100 acres that will create a huge nature preserve in southern Beaumont. Outdoor lovers will hike, ride horses and bird watch when it opens in several years... 2 Missing Condors Might Have Perished in October's Piru Blaze Two California condors that were seen in the vicinity of the 64,000-acre Piru fire in October have not been spotted again by wildlife officials, who fear they may have perished. The birds were among the 39 living in a number of wild regions in California, where the species nearly died out in the mid-1980s...Train being proposed to solve traffic jams at Grand Canyon To remedy the traffic congestion at the park's South Rim and on State Route 64, the Grand Canyon's tourist railroad has proposed a $186 million high-speed train. The rail service would begin in 2005 and run from Williams, reducing vehicle traffic on the South Rim by 50 percent, according to Grand Canyon Railway's proposal...Cattle Grazers Welcome New Grazing Rules Livestock interests in the West are welcoming the Interior Department's proposed new federal rules for grazing on public lands, though they could cause some short-term harm to the environment. Olson called the proposed grazing rules a positive step, showing the government is willing to work with ranchers, and the rules could benefit both rancher and range. "If I lease BLM land, I'm supposed to have enough private land to support those cattle when they're not on BLM land. That's one of the reasons we say this helps ranchers prevent urban sprawl," she said. "Because if they don't have the rangeland to run on in the summer, there's a possibility of them selling it for subdivisions."...BLM: No significant impact from methane drilling The U.S. Bureau of Land Management says no significant environmental effects will result from drilling for coal-bed methane near Baggs. The Brown Cow Pod is one of nine pods with up to 200 wells proposed as part of the Atlantic Rim coal-bed methane project...Protecting Utah's open spaces How do we measure 20 years of work by the Utah Nature Conservancy? Do we count the increasing number of conservancy members, volunteers and conservation projects? Do we total the number of acres forever protected? Or evaluate the attitudes toward open space forever changed? Or do we measure whether our civilization is indeed growing to match this state's spectacular scenery? It's a little bit of all of those things, say the people who have watched the organization grow during the past two decades...Cowpuncher brothers' late-life pastime corrals fans of rustic furniture Tom and Jack Musser are bent and bowlegged. Tom's 81-year-old back is permanently out-of-kilter. Jack's 84-year-old joints are a tad awry. These two lifelong cowpunchers are a little too rickety to ride the range or bust broncs anymore. So they have turned to making furniture. It looks a lot like them - rustic and all akimbo, with legs that jut in arthritic angles, arms that crook and backs and tops not even remotely in plum. None of their furniture is like anything anyone would learn to make in a how-to class at Home Depot or buy at the local Furniture Mart. And that's what has caught the eye of ritzy mountain mansion owners and appreciative cabin dwellers, who snap up the Musser brothers' one-of-a-kind pieces almost as fast as they make them. To buyers, the Mussers' creations are folk art - treasured Americana...On The Edge Of Common Sense - Baxterizing: Misinterpreting something obvious Once these changes were made, then we could redistribute the amount of federal lands equally across the 48 states. Which, according to Statistical Abstract, would be 28 percent per state. In Ohio, for instance, under the Federal Lands Equality Act, eminent domain would be inflicted on everything north of Lima. Displaced residents would have six months to leave, then gray wolves, grizzly bears, Florida panthers, spotted owls, condors and snail darter minnows would be reintroduced. In Massachusetts, all the land west of Boston would be reclaimed and turned into a Buffalo Commons. Nevada, which before the new gerrymandering was 83 percent federally owned, would open up private land for homesteaders from states unaccustomed to living under the thumb of the federal government...
Private help comes to public land The U.S. Forest Service once managed and paid the bills for everything concerning the national forests, from timber sales to firefighting to campground and trail maintenance. But increasingly, nonprofit, community-based forestry groups are stepping forward to provide some of those services, using federal dollars from grant programs and private money from foundations and individuals to hire independent contractors. During the past decade, the community-based groups have sprouted in Oregon and throughout the West. They've filled a gap caused by Forest Service budget cuts that followed a decline in timber revenue after logging on national forests was sharply curtailed in the 1990s...Conflict looms over timber It's a new year and new battles are on the horizon between environmentalists and the Bush administration over federal forests in the Pacific Northwest -- but the theme is continuing conflict. Central to the clash are changes the Bush administration is making this year in the Northwest Forest Plan, the document hammered out under President Clinton in 1994 to end the standoff over logging federal old-growth forests. Government officials are expected this month and next to finalize rule changes that will make it easier to carry out timber sales without explicitly protecting salmon, and without extensive surveys to discover whether logging would endanger more than 300 hard-to-find slugs, snails, lichens and other species. Later in the year, officials are expected to finalize reviews of whether the spotted owl and another rare bird, the marbled murrelet, should continue to be protected under the Endangered Species Act...Forest plan a regulatory war There is one thing Colorado's two giant ski resort competitors agree on: the revised White River Forest Plan adopted in 2002 has some provisions that need to be changed. That new plan restricts both the acreage available for ski area expansion and imposes stricter clean water standards for ski areas. Both provisions are being appealed by Vail Resorts, Intrawest and Colorado Ski Country USA, an industry advocacy group... Oil rigs help biologists unlock mystery of ocean life From his office in downtown New Orleans, Dan Allen can see to the bottom of the ocean. Allen, a marine biologist with Chevron Texaco, studies the ocean's depths using images from the remote-controlled vehicles that fix oil pipelines and wells on the sea floor as well as the eyes of hundreds of workers manning offshore platforms. "We just recently discovered a very large shark in the Gulf of Mexico in about 10,000 feet of water. It was the first ever observed in the Gulf," Allen said. "We want to get feedback from people offshore as to what they are seeing when and where." For land-bound academics and the hardcore biologists working for major corporations, oil exploration has become a surrogate for scientific research unlike ever before...Soar subject The 3-month-old bald eaglets huddled like two scared kids while a gaggle of photographers surrounded them at the Barr Lake gazebo. Division of Wildlife raptor expert Jerry Craig had snatched them out of their nest at the edge of the lake and boated to the gazebo so spectators could watch as he weighed the eaglets, drew blood from them and crimped bands on their legs...Bear advocate an enigma in death Timothy Treadwell's death came just the way he had predicted. Treadwell and his girlfriend were mauled by a 1,000-pound grizzly bear last October in a remote section of Alaskan wilderness that Treadwell knew well after years of living among its bear population. He had started an environmental group and received donations from celebrities such as actor Leonardo DiCaprio, in part by saying the bears he loved were in jeopardy. He spun colorful stories about his adventures for the Discovery Channel, David Letterman's late-night audience and the Walt Disney Co. What few knew about Treadwell was that much of his life was an invention...Salton Sea's mud delays dike plan Scientists have uncovered a distressing secret about the lakebed of the Salton Sea: Portions of it are covered with a 50-foot-thick layer of silt the consistency of peanut butter. That revelation is particularly troubling for California's largest lake, a place of promise and despair that has endured three decades of scientific study and political haggling. The latest findings place in jeopardy a proposal by state and federal agencies to build an 81/2-mile dike across the desolate and smelly lake to stave off ecological disaster. Salton Sea Authority officials say the costs of that plan could increase 200 percent, to $3 billion...Lockheed sells rocket test site near Beaumont as preserve Behind a padlocked gate sits thousands of acres filled with stands of cottonwoods and willows, a gentle stream, big granite boulders and abundant wildlife, including deer, bobcat and quail. It's also a spot where aerospace giant Lockheed tested rocket engines for America's space program at the height of the Cold War. On Friday, government agencies and environmentalists announced a $25.5 million land deal for about 9,100 acres that will create a huge nature preserve in southern Beaumont. Outdoor lovers will hike, ride horses and bird watch when it opens in several years... 2 Missing Condors Might Have Perished in October's Piru Blaze Two California condors that were seen in the vicinity of the 64,000-acre Piru fire in October have not been spotted again by wildlife officials, who fear they may have perished. The birds were among the 39 living in a number of wild regions in California, where the species nearly died out in the mid-1980s...Train being proposed to solve traffic jams at Grand Canyon To remedy the traffic congestion at the park's South Rim and on State Route 64, the Grand Canyon's tourist railroad has proposed a $186 million high-speed train. The rail service would begin in 2005 and run from Williams, reducing vehicle traffic on the South Rim by 50 percent, according to Grand Canyon Railway's proposal...Cattle Grazers Welcome New Grazing Rules Livestock interests in the West are welcoming the Interior Department's proposed new federal rules for grazing on public lands, though they could cause some short-term harm to the environment. Olson called the proposed grazing rules a positive step, showing the government is willing to work with ranchers, and the rules could benefit both rancher and range. "If I lease BLM land, I'm supposed to have enough private land to support those cattle when they're not on BLM land. That's one of the reasons we say this helps ranchers prevent urban sprawl," she said. "Because if they don't have the rangeland to run on in the summer, there's a possibility of them selling it for subdivisions."...BLM: No significant impact from methane drilling The U.S. Bureau of Land Management says no significant environmental effects will result from drilling for coal-bed methane near Baggs. The Brown Cow Pod is one of nine pods with up to 200 wells proposed as part of the Atlantic Rim coal-bed methane project...Protecting Utah's open spaces How do we measure 20 years of work by the Utah Nature Conservancy? Do we count the increasing number of conservancy members, volunteers and conservation projects? Do we total the number of acres forever protected? Or evaluate the attitudes toward open space forever changed? Or do we measure whether our civilization is indeed growing to match this state's spectacular scenery? It's a little bit of all of those things, say the people who have watched the organization grow during the past two decades...Cowpuncher brothers' late-life pastime corrals fans of rustic furniture Tom and Jack Musser are bent and bowlegged. Tom's 81-year-old back is permanently out-of-kilter. Jack's 84-year-old joints are a tad awry. These two lifelong cowpunchers are a little too rickety to ride the range or bust broncs anymore. So they have turned to making furniture. It looks a lot like them - rustic and all akimbo, with legs that jut in arthritic angles, arms that crook and backs and tops not even remotely in plum. None of their furniture is like anything anyone would learn to make in a how-to class at Home Depot or buy at the local Furniture Mart. And that's what has caught the eye of ritzy mountain mansion owners and appreciative cabin dwellers, who snap up the Musser brothers' one-of-a-kind pieces almost as fast as they make them. To buyers, the Mussers' creations are folk art - treasured Americana...On The Edge Of Common Sense - Baxterizing: Misinterpreting something obvious Once these changes were made, then we could redistribute the amount of federal lands equally across the 48 states. Which, according to Statistical Abstract, would be 28 percent per state. In Ohio, for instance, under the Federal Lands Equality Act, eminent domain would be inflicted on everything north of Lima. Displaced residents would have six months to leave, then gray wolves, grizzly bears, Florida panthers, spotted owls, condors and snail darter minnows would be reintroduced. In Massachusetts, all the land west of Boston would be reclaimed and turned into a Buffalo Commons. Nevada, which before the new gerrymandering was 83 percent federally owned, would open up private land for homesteaders from states unaccustomed to living under the thumb of the federal government...
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