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From: TSS ()
Government to scale back mad cow testing The Agriculture Department boosted its surveillance after finding the first case of mad cow disease in the United States in 2003. About 1,000 tests are run daily, up from about 55 daily in 2003. The testing program detected an infected cow in Alabama last week, and further analysis confirmed Monday that the animal had mad cow disease. Still, a reduction in testing has been in the works for months. The department's chief veterinarian, John Clifford, mentioned it when he announced the new case of mad cow disease. "As we approach the conclusion of our enhanced surveillance program, let me offer a few thoughts," Clifford said, explaining that the U.S. will follow international standards for testing. Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns pointed out testing is not a food safety measure. Rather, it's a way to find out the prevalence of the disease. "Keep in mind the testing was for surveillance," Johanns told reporters Monday in Warsaw, Poland, where he was attending trade talks. "It was to get an idea of the condition of the herd." Higher testing levels were intended to be temporary when they were announced two years ago. Yet consumer groups argue more animals should be tested, not fewer. Officials haven't finalized new levels, but the department's budget proposal calls for 40,000 tests annually, or about 110 daily. "This would be a tenth of a percent of all animals slaughtered," Jean Halloran, director of food policy initiatives at Consumers Union, said Tuesday. "This starts to be so small that in our opinion, it approaches a policy of don't look, don't find." Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin said the confidence of American consumers and foreign customers is at risk. "USDA ought to continue a sound surveillance testing program to demonstrate that U.S. beef is indeed safe and that anti-BSE safeguards are, in fact, working," said Harkin, senior Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee. Consumer groups want every animal to be tested, said Gary Weber, head of regulatory affairs for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association in Denver. "It's not cost-effective; it's not necessary," Weber said. "The consumers we've done focus groups with are comfortable that this is a very rare disease and we've got safeguards in place." He mentioned government protections to keep the disease from the food chain for people or animals. "All those things add up to safety," he said. The department mostly tests older cows with symptoms of the disease. Infected cows can show signs of nervous system disorder, such as aggression, lack of coordination, inability to walk or abnormal posture. In the latest case, the cow couldn't walk. It was a "downer," another sign of the disease. Dead cows are also suspect. Tests are done on brain tissue from cows, so animals must be killed before they can be tested. There is no test for the disease in a live animal. Since June 2004, the department has tested 652,697 cows for the disease. The nation has about 95 million cattle. The medical name for mad cow disease is bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. In humans, eating meat contaminated with BSE is linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, a rare and deadly nerve disease. An outbreak in the United Kingdom killed more than 180,000 cows and was blamed for more than 150 human deaths. It began in 1986 and spread throughout Europe, peaking in 1993. The first American case appeared 10 years later in Washington state in a Canadian-born cow. The disease was found again last June in a Texas cow. ON THE NET Agriculture Department: http://www.usda.gov http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/news/breaking_news/14098470.htm > government intends to scale back testing is this not the biggest hoot you ever heard, they never started with any kind of credible BSE testing protocol to begin with. the usda june 2004 enhanced bse surveillance program is the biggest joke now going around the globe now. everyone is laughing at it. if the long arm of GWs regime does not come forth and demand the complete overhaul of the usda minus home land security, and retest at least everyone of the 600,000+ cows in the enhance cover-up of june 2004 of bse, then this past 20 months of so of testing has fooled no one, maybe some at the federal gov level and some cattle ranchers/feeders, but most of them are as fed up with usda et al as i am. .... National Veterinary Services Laboratory (NVSL) Immunohistochemistry (IHC) Testing Summary The BSE enhanced surveillance program involves the use of a rapid screening test, followed by confirmatory testing for any samples that come back "inconclusive." The weekly summary below captures all rapid tests conducted as part of the enhanced surveillance effort. It should be noted that since the enhanced surveillance program began, USDA has also conducted approximately 9,200 routine IHC tests on samples that did not first undergo rapid testing. This was done to ensure that samples inappropriate for the rapid screen test were still tested, and also to monitor and improve upon IHC testing protocols. Of those 9,200 routine tests, one test returned a non-definitive result on July 27, 2005. That sample underwent additional testing at NVSL, as well as at the Veterinary Laboratories Agency in Weybridge, England, and results were negative. Weekly Summary Cumulative Total from June 1, 2004: 439,126 USDA 2003 We have to be careful that we don't get so set in the way we do things that Dr. Detwiler: That's on the slaughter. But on the clinical cases, aren't Dr. Keller: Tissues are routinely tested, based on which tissue provides an Dr. Detwiler: That's on the slaughter. But on the clinical cases, aren't By LIBBY QUAID In those cases, only one type of test was used _ one that failed to detect the disease in an infected Texas cow. Conducted over the past 14 months, the tests have not been included in the department's running tally of mad cow disease tests since last summer. That total reached 439,126 on Wednesday. "There's no secret program," the department's chief veterinarian, John Clifford, said in an interview. "There has been no hiding, I can assure you of that." Officials intended to report the tests later in an annual report, Clifford said. These 9,200 cases were different because brain tissue samples were preserved with formalin, which makes them suitable for only one type of test _ immunohistochemistry, or IHC. In the Texas case, officials had declared the cow free of disease in November after an IHC test came back negative. The department's inspector general ordered an additional kind of test, which confirmed the animal was infected. Veterinarians in remote locations have used the preservative on tissue to keep it from degrading on its way to the department's laboratory in Ames, Iowa. Officials this year asked veterinarians to stop using preservative and send fresh or chilled samples within 48 hours. The department recently investigated a possible case of mad cow disease that turned up in a preserved sample. Further testing ruled out the disease two weeks ago. Scientists used two additional tests _ rapid screening and Western blot _ to help detect mad cow disease in the country's second confirmed case, in a Texas cow in June. They used IHC and Western blot to confirm the first case, in a Washington state cow in December 2003. "The IHC test is still an excellent test," Clifford said. "These are not simple tests, either." Clifford pointed out that scientists reran the IHC several times and got conflicting results. That happened, too, with the Western blot test. Both tests are accepted by international animal health officials. The formal name for mad cow disease is bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. In humans, consuming meat products tainted with BSE is linked to a fatal disorder called variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. The disease has killed about 150 people, most of them in Britain, where there was an outbreak in the 1980s and 1990s. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/17/AR2005081701635.html THE USA BSE GBR RISK ASSESSMENT SHOULD BE IMMEDIATELY REASSESSED TO BSE GBR IV. >>>"There's no secret program," the department's chief veterinarian, John Clifford, said in an interview. "There has been no hiding, I can assure you of that."<<< THERE should be an inquiry into this continued incompetence of the USDA et al. my God, we have all become exposed to this deadly agent due to there continued lies, deceit and cover ups.in essence, what the USDA did in force feeding the globe all these TSEs, was far worse than what MAFF did in exporting there poison around the globe in the 80s. the USA has exposed the globe to there poison by this BSE/TSE MRR policy, and if you dont eat it, they'll just through sanctions at you. ... Report Summary The European Food Safety Authority and its Scientific Expert Working Group on the Assessment of the Geographical Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) Risk (GBR) were asked by the European Commission (EC) to provide an up-to-date scientific report on the GBR in the United States of America, i.e. the likelihood of the presence of one or more cattle being infected with BSE, pre-clinically as well as clinically, in USA. This scientific report addresses the GBR of USA as assessed in 2004 based on data covering the period 1980-2003. The BSE agent was probably imported into USA and could have reached domestic cattle in the middle of the eighties. These cattle imported in the mid eighties could have been rendered in the late eighties and therefore led to an internal challenge in the early nineties. It is possible that imported meat and bone meal (MBM) into the USA reached domestic cattle and leads to an internal challenge in the early nineties. A processing risk developed in the late 80s/early 90s when cattle imports from BSE risk countries were slaughtered or died and were processed (partly) into feed, together with some imports of MBM. This risk continued to exist, and grew significantly in the mid 90’s when domestic cattle, infected by imported MBM, reached processing. Given the low stability of the system, the risk increased over the years with continued imports of cattle and MBM from BSE risk countries. EFSA concludes that the current GBR level of USA is III, i.e. it is likely but not confirmed that domestic cattle are (clinically or pre-clinically) infected with the BSE-agent. As long as there are no significant changes in rendering or feeding, the stability remains extremely/very unstable. Thus, the probability of cattle to be (pre-clinically or clinically) infected with the BSE-agent persistently increases. Greetings FDA, snip... PLUS, if the USA continues to flagrantly ignore the _documented_ science to date about the known TSEs in the USA (let alone the undocumented TSEs in cattle), it is my opinion, every other Country that is dealing with BSE/TSE should boycott the USA and demand that the SSC reclassify the USA BSE GBR II risk assessment to BSE/TSE GBR III 'IMMEDIATELY'. for the SSC to _flounder_ any longer on this issue, should also be regarded with great suspicion as well. NOT to leave out the OIE and it's terribly flawed system of disease surveillance. the OIE should make a move on CWD in the USA, and make a risk assessment on this as a threat to human health. the OIE should also change the mathematical formula for testing of disease. this (in my opinion and others) is terribly flawed as well. to think that a sample survey of 400 or so cattle in a population of 100 million, to think this will find anything, especially after seeing how many TSE tests it took Italy and other Countries to find 1 case of BSE (1 million rapid TSE test in less than 2 years, to find 102 BSE cases), should be proof enough to make drastic changes of this system. the OIE criteria for BSE Country classification and it's interpretation is very problematic. a text that is suppose to give guidelines, but is not understandable, cannot be considered satisfactory. the OIE told me 2 years ago that they were concerned with CWD, but said any changes might take years. well, two years have come and gone, and no change in relations with CWD as a human health risk. if we wait for politics and science to finally make this connection, we very well may die before any decisions still disgusted in bacliff texas...TSS
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