Mad cow disease: A shot heard round the world

03/01/2001

Mark A. DeSorbo

NICE, FRANCE—European Union (EU) leaders continue to cope with mad cow disease outbreaks amid negotiations on several issues regarding proposed food safety legislation and the establishment of an agency that attempts to mirror the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

However, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service says the EU has not formally asked the United States for advice, nor has guidance been offered.

Meanwhile, the EU estimates that dealing with the mad cow crisis could cost about $1 billion and put agricultural programs at risk. EU executives report that cost of carrying out mandated tests for mad cow on cattle over 30 months, along with a "purchase for destruction" program, are expected to diminish the agricultural budget.

Mad cow, also known as bovine spongiform ecephalopathy (BSE), causes prions, proteins in the brain, to change shape, affecting other brain cells and forming sponge-like holes in brain tissue, which leads to dementia and ultimately death. Health officials throughout the world believe grain and vegetable feed that is made with the remains of the same animals it is intended for is the cause of the brain-debilitating disease.

In early February, the United Nations said Eastern Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and India had the highest risk among countries outside Western Europe of harboring mad cow disease.

All told, about 125 cases have been discovered throughout Europe. The human variant of the illness, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), has killed 90 people in England, France and Ireland.

US on the alert
The mad cow scare has heightened concerned in the United States, as well. In January, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory panel recommended that anyone who had lived in France, Portugal or Ireland for a total of 10 years since 1980 be prohibited from donating blood. Regulations adopted last year excluded anyone who lived in England for six months between 1980 and 1996.

The American Red Cross has also urged the FDA to apply the six month rule to all of Western Europe, which would cut the supply of donors by about five percent, even though there is no evidence that the disease can be transmitted through blood.

A week after the FDA recommendation, the agency investigated whether people would be at risk of mad cow disease as a result of 1,200 cattle that may have been fed the ground-up remains of other cattle by mistake. The agency contends that people are not at risk of contracting mad cow disease. In addition, some imported German candy that may have been made with gelatin from at-risk cattle probably also poses no threat, the FDA said.

Mad cow takes its toll
The outbreak is indeed spreading madness throughout Europe. According to Reuters, German Health Minister Andrea Fischer, democratic party Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder as well as several other officials resigned in early January, saying the public had lost faith in their ministry.

While Germany, France and Ireland prepared to slaughter more than 400,000 cattle, Italy continued to hash out its first case of mad cow disease, which was discovered in late January. Health Minister Umberto Veronesi's suggestion to ban the traditional Tuscan T-bone delicacy outraged restaurateurs and the meat industry, both of who openly talk of revolt.

"Florence is rebelling and will defend the symbol of Tuscan cuisine," an editorial in the city's newspaper La Nazione said. "The health minister is very much mistaken if he thinks he can destroy centuries-old traditions and a piece of our identity with the sweep of a pen and a speech."

Mad-cow-like disease in US
Although the FDA and the Red Cross have concerns that mad cow will rear its ugly head in the United States, other records from The Center for Food Safety (CFS), obtained on the agency's Web site indicate that the disease, or some form of it, is already here, and has been for some time.

On January 7, 1999, CFS filed two legal petitions demanding that the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) act immediately to monitor, regulate and prevent "mad cow" type diseases in the US, saying people, deer, elk and sheep are dying.

The legal petitions, which charge the United States efforts have been "grossly inadequate," were filed on behalf of a 30-year old Utah man, R. Douglas McEwen, who is now terminally ill with CJD.

"McEwen hunted deer and elk. It is feared that he may have contracted CJD by eating or handling deer or elk infected with mad deer disease," a newsletter on the Web site said. "There is additional concern because McEwen was a frequent blood donor, and may have contaminated blood products internationally. McEwen is a petitioner in the local action along with the CFS."

The second legal petition demands that the FDA tighten animal feed regulations on animal feed and practices, which the CFS says can lead to mad cow-type diseases in animals and humans.

"Current regulations allow calves to be fed milk replacement containing cattle blood protein, and pigs to be fed back to pigs and cattle," the CFS Web site indicates. "US sheep infected with scrapie, a mad cow-type disease, can be used for pet and pig feed."

The petition would require meat suppliers to maintain paperwork on meat supply sources for 10 years instead of just one year. "They are only required to keep paperwork for one year, which makes the information useless because CJD infection can remain dormant for years before symptoms occur," according to CFS.

At the time of this report, Mexico issued a temporary import ban on Brazilian beef products, officially joining Canada and the United States in the measure to avoid mad cow disease and its deadly human variation.

The announcement came just after an agriculture official told Reuters that Mexico was in talks with its North American Free Trade Agreement partners to impose a ban on all beef products from Brazil, including gravy, corned beef, gelatins and other beef products or products made with beef components.

There has been an export ban on British beef since 1996, when BSE hit British cattle. German officials and farmers had insisted that the country was free of the disease because it did not use animal products in feed, widely thought to be a source of transmission for the disease.

But since systematic testing was begun last fall, nine cases have so far been confirmed. Officials say it is the result of grain and vegetable feed being tainted with animal matter.

Beef sales throughout Europe, according to the EU, have plummeted by nearly 30 percent, and many countries throughout the world, such as Kuwait, have banned the importation of European beef and ruminants.