This infected cow in Washington has the potential of crippling our beef export industry. It looks to me like a case of the industry shooting itself in the foot and unduly influencing the government to weaken regulation.

These are the two main problems as I understand it from recent reading.
#1. Cows get the disease from eating the brains and or the spine of an infected animal. And, for some crazy reason (everything but the squeal or in this case the moo?) some cattle are given feed that contains cow brains and spinal cords. (Ultimate Joe referred to this in the first thread about Mad Cow disease in the USA and called it cannibalism)
#2 Our industry allows the processing of animals called downers that are too ill or infirmed to make it into a slaughter house on their own legs.

It is also my understanding that several bills have been defeated in congress in the past few years under pressure from the cattle industry (which had its opinions supported by the Agriculture Department)

Is this an example of government corruption failing to protect American health and the American economy (beef exports down 90% and facing a possible loss to the industry of $6 billion per year) or did the industry and the government act correctly in this case?
If this is a regulatory failure, does this problem need to be fixed?

Industry resisted warnings over beef

Seems that the mad cow came from Canada. But did it get infected in Canada or the US?

Where did the meat go? We know where it came from, but figuring out where it went seems to be a problem.

You know, the notion of organic beef is making sense on several levels here. Organic beef is highly regulated to maintain its classification. It is more expensive that standard beef, but hey, what's your life worth?

Not so long ago, Colorado had a bad batch of ground beef that made lots of people sick. Think it killed some. That turned out to be a failure in regulation.

As this sort of thing keeps on happening, I imagine the national mood will turn toward more tightly regulated food industries. Nobody wants to play Russian roulette with the groceries.

Yes, it's a problem.

Of a population of 96 million cows, only 19,990 have been tested for "mad cow" disease. By contrast, in Europe, EVERY cow of a certain age is tested. Link

The cow in Washington state was slaughtered and sent out to be processed and delivered to stores BEFORE the results of the "mad cow" test were known... and the cow had to be delivered to the slaughterer on a forklift because it couldn't walk. This shows that just testing cows doesn't work and the USDA isn't doing it's job of policing the industry. And the "industry" can't be trusted to police itself.

Oh no no no, if the government got off everyone's back the customers would flock to the suppliers who had the highest hygiene standards and the meatpackers would be falling over themselves trying to satisfy that demand. It's all the government's fault; without them the invisible hand would just take care of everything.

Anyone who believes that should be tested to see if they already have CJD.

Actually, the rapid-screening tests which are currently available in Europe are not approved to be used here yet. The tests which have been available take two weeks for results. I'm certain this will probably change now that we've had our first postive.

One of the important stories on Mad Cow comes out of Canada in Jan of 2003 when an infected cow was found in Alberta Canada.

http://www.phxnews.com/fullstory.php?article=8342

I'd be careful here. The Canadian government is extremely angry at the USDA and APHIS for essentially releasing preliminary information. The U.S. has "identified" the cow as belonging to a Canadian herd but there are some severe inconsistencies. Here's an article on the subject.

Eeyore,

I heard tonight on the news that the US stopped allowing this in August of 1997. No cow parts are allowed in their feed.

That would be good news if the cows born before 1997 (like the one in Washington) were subject to testing for Mad Cow Disease.

Perhaps organic beef is the answer here. Nothing wrong with increasing the standards for the foods we ingest on our own. But I worry that organic standards would relax if it became a major part of the market.

Organic agriculture isn't the wonder it's made out to be. It did a pretty lousy job for the Irish potato industry a while back...

Bella... cows are not cannibalized in the US anymore this is true, but there are other ways that cow protein can make it's way into feed. Cross-species animal feed is still allowed. If you feed a cow to a pig, and then feed the pig back to another cow, does that pose a risk to the cow itself?

A Harvard study finds BSE poses little threat to U.S. consumers, agriculture .

...the FDA prohibited the use of most mammalian protein in the manufacture of animal feed intended for cows and other ruminants.

I don't think a pig falls into the category of ruminant, but it would fall into the category of mammalian, wouldn't it? Have you found information indicating that cows are fed pigs since 1997, UJ?

I wouldnt call this proof but Ive found the same info twice:

'The Food and Drug Administration and the United States
Department of Agriculture realized a decade ago that feeding rendered
slaughterhouse waste to livestock should be completely banned, but to
appease the meat industry has not done so. Instead, five years ago the FDA
passed a poorly enforced regulation that all meat and bone meal from
ruminant animals (cattle, sheep, deer) should be labeled not to be fed to
other ruminants. However, the blood from ruminants is exempt, and in
Wisconsin and other states calves are fed raw cattle blood plasma as a
protein source in milk replacer and calf starter. Cattle meat and bone and
blood meal is fed to pigs, which are fed to cattle, by the billions of
pounds a year. Deer, elk and sheep known to be infected with mad cow-type
disease can legally be rendered and fed to pigs, and pigs are fed to pigs.
Deer and elk on game farms and in the wild are fed supplemental fat, protein
and minerals even to this day. In other words, the US is widely engaging in
practices almost guaranteed to spread TSE disease in the US.
In 1995 alone, more than 26,000 road killed deer were picked up off
Wisconsin roadways and rendered into meat and bone meal used for animal
feed. It¹s possible CWD has already been spread to deer, cattle and other
livestock via such feeding practices. (July 2002)
http://www.maddeer.org/madmadmad.html

In May 2003, the Food and Drug Administration finally drafted up proposed voluntary "suggestions" for the rendering industry, recommending that deer and elk infected with chronic wasting disease, or at high risk for the disease, be excluded from animal feed.[21] However, even if this proposal is enacted, it represents only non-binding, non-enforceable "guidance" recommendations for the industry. The FDA made these same kinds of "guidance" recommendations to pharmaceutical companies over a decade ago, discouraging the use of bovine-derived materials from countries with mad cow disease in manufacturing their vaccines,[22] only to learn 7 years later that major pharmaceutical manufacturers simply ignored the guidelines.[23]

Europe's Scientific Steering Committee met in 2003 and agreed that the United States should comply with the World Health Organization guidelines and ban the feeding of animals infected with chronic wasting disease to other animals.[24] The United States seems to remain the only country that knowingly allows prion infected animals to be fed to other animals, including those destined for the dinner plate.
http://organicconsumers.org/madcow/GregerBSE.cfm

Hot off the presses:

USDA Bans Downer Cattle from Human Food



Too sick to walk, but it was just fine that we ate it??!? What took them so long?



Ok, I'm now grossed out about the burger I had last night.



Hmm... and what if the cow doesn't show signs of the disease, which can take several years to appear? No mention of that in the article.

As you might have guessed, I'm not impressed.

I think that the Mad cow disease is caused by the poor conditions that animals live in... look at this link...

Im honestly not to worried. The US hasnt used brains or spine tissue in cow feed since 97 is what I have been told and both of these cows (both now confirmed Canadian?) were born before 97. I dont think this will be an epidemic. VCJD isnt airborne. Cows dont cough this on other cows. Even in Britain while they had hundreds of thousands of infected cows and many consumers ate the meat before the halt only like 140 Brits ever contracted VCJD. Mad cow is no more dangerous then salminella or showers for that matter. I think its overblown. My uncle is a state health inspector who has friends at the federal level. He said that if Americans knew how their food was processed they would never eat again. He told me one story in particular about name brand peanut butter and rats. I just think this is an anomalie. Im not to worried and I will continue to eat beef.