Scary Stuff and Interesting read (MadCow) Related

It should be well known that the USDA "inspection" process is a joke, as the "inspectors" might as well be employees of the corporations they're "inspecting". Unfortunately, most people probably don't know how inadequate the procedures are, nor how understaffed the agency is. This is another example of an issue that is kept as quiet as possible by the partys involved, as they deem that it is acceptable to allow for the possibility of some collateral damage, in order to keep their profits up. When the issue does rear its ugly head, then our officials go on TV, and assure us that they're doing all they can to protect our health and welfare. The public responds by clamoring for better protection, the government tells them that they'll look into it, the corporation and government inspectors will sit down together, draw up some fancy worded document to soothe the public's nerve's, and nothing will really be done, and life will go on.

what gets me is the cow made it into the food system, the cow that was discovered in Canada looked a little sick, which made it unusable for food and why they tested it in the first place. The cow in the us was unable to even walk and still ended up as food. Thats just messed up.

Thank you for the link. That was an interesting and disturbing article. If one of the world's experts on prion diseases, Stanley Prusiner, is worried about our beef supply, then I'm listening.
Does anybody know whether organically-grown beef is any less likely to be infected with BSE? I would think that they would not be receiving cattle parts in their feed.

VERY good article.

Makes you realize that, for a supposedly civilized country, the U.S. (and other "advanced" countries) are still nothing more than barbarians and little more than cavemen wearing suits.

The way that our slaughterhouses have handled beef (and other animals for consumption) is reeally disgusting.

The other issue is that everyone in the U.S. EXPECTS to eat beef -- and eat it cheaply -- and that results in poor standards.

I eat a lot of turkey and I know that poultry processing probably isn't much better, but at least I'm not going to get Creutzfeld-Jacobs disease in my brain from it.

I'll get OTHER things, just not THAT.

On top of which, hitting the news this hour is that the meat from that sick cow DID go to consumers all over the United States:

Read here.

Just lovely.

We have sick and dying animals so what do we do with them? WE FEED THEM TO OURSELVES.

If that isn't disgusting, I don't know what else is.

Just go out and scoop up road kill next time.

ahh, good thing the Fillet isnt infected. its all real steak eaters eat.

In reality food just medications run the risk of serious injury. We still have to focus on the fact that our food and medications are the safest in the world. Nothing is perfect, there can be no 100% risk free guarantee.

Actually, fireside, the article says that ALL of the tissue, filets or not, is infected.

One thing I like to add to all the BLAME CANADA BS is that the standards are pretty much the same for both Canada and the US in feeds and inspections, there is only one real difference between the two countries is that Americans will still eat sick cows and Canada wont which is clear with the US MadCow making it to tables while the Canadian cow was deamed unfit for humans. Fact is we both have the same problems and we are both going to suffer bad in coming years.

One thing that is important to note, if the Canadian records are right the cow that was supose to be from Canada was born just before the feed ban which could be how it was infected which leads the question how many others could have been being that if it was in the feed, others must have eating it too. If the US records are right and this cow is 4 years old, this is well after the feed bans then some one out there is still feeding cows to cows which would have the same result, alot more cows infected. Now that Canadian cow was found to be isolated and we have a very good system for tracking cows so this cow was either a strange mutation which they think can happen or it was infected by Chicken or Pig proten which that article talks about, Cows feed to pigs then pigs feed back to cows could have the same results as cow feed to cow. If that is the case the World Health Org is totally right to claim North Americans meat is very dangerous and we have a ticking time bomb.

In the end it all comes down to money, it costs to test, its cheaper to use animal proten in food, and it costs to do inspections. So we are always going to be faced with this issue, I cant see testing of every single cow, thats alot of cows, I cant see every farmer not trying to save a buck buy reusing cows for feed even though it is illegal because the last factor more inspections will also cost money so farmers will get away with it. Hell Downer cows are eating because farmers dont want to waste any income.

Organic cows are a little bit safer if the method of killing them and removing the brain and spinal tissue is done right, but nothing is 100%. Like the article says the current stun methods splater the cows brain all over the animals guts and gets into the muscles too. I think we are going to have a major problem soon.

Ha ha, you should make that Sig sized!

Well an update about the Mad Cow problem. Its looking like the cow infected in Canada and the one found in the US assuming it is from the shipment of cows to the US 3 years ago could have been infected by a food mill in Edmonton that used cow parts in feed before the 1997 ban on cow protein was put in effect. Whats worse is that mill used cows from Northern Alberta which means from 1990's to at least 1997 there where cows infected with Mad Cow undetected, it is prob the same in the US too. Canada tests 3 times the cows % as the US and none have been found until this year. If feed had it back then that means cows back then had it which means there must have been some cows that have made it to food to infect people. I bet in the next 15 years there are going to be a few people found infected because of all this i the 90's.

http://www.canada.com/national/stor...C0-BC4C217BCDF9

WARNING: Athens doesn't like jewish people.

Must you ruin another perfectly good thread? Just because ThinkInsane locked yours doesn't mean you can just carry your ******** elsewhere.

Edit: Hey, look! We can say ******** and it isn't censored!

Thats absolute ********, and now I def dont like you so get stuffed

Just happened to stumble on this piece at foxnews.com. Thought I'd add it to the discussion.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,107188,00.html

I hate to disagree with you WD, but I don't believe that this is correct. Ours (UK) are pretty much the safest in the world, brought about by the rigourous tests now in place after our little food scares.

It should say it all that the recent BSE scare over there in North America hasn't triggered any additional import bans from the EU because your meat was already on the banned list and listed as unsafe.

I think a country/continent has to go through the whole scare thing and come out the other side before truly rigourous testing is put into place and the product can claim to be the safest in the World.

I agree, we are told our food is safe but it dosent mean it is. Its safe enough and safer then most poor places in the world, but it could be alot better. And after reading that article about BSE I wonder more now then ever.

This problem will probably get much larger as we find out that farmers for decades have been getting away with insane farming practises. What irks me is some of the crazy American practises in the food industry, animals plied with antibiotics and all sorts of things, thankfully the EU has pretty much banned such American imports, from what I can remember.

My brother was out in New York last month, he loves to eat out and he ended up on a night out with some friends going out for dinner. He had some meat based dish, and the next day was seriously ill, his other friend who is from the UK, had the exact same trouble too, the crap that is pumped into animals is something that I don't know how you guys put up with.

Hey all!,
I don't know much about Mad Cow
I read the article, it was very intersting and I just have one question

From what I have seen cow eats grass, hay and this one time when i was a kid i fed my pet cow a flower...

My question is: Why the f**k would you feed it meat?, not only that why would you feed it meat of other dead cows?
and blood????

Why would somone do that?

Sounds crazy to me!, lucky my dad has a small farm so i can eat his cows, I know all they have been eating is grass, oh and a flower

Oh yeah, thanks for the article again
- Zoom ZOOm

In the other thread there was a link to a BBC article stating that vCJD has been passed on through blood donations and, due to the long incubation time of the disease, could be a potential time bomb, although I think blood is now checked to vCJD.

Although I doubt that there is going to be a big epidemic of vCJD, as not that many people in the UK got it compared to the number of cows infected with BSE which got into the food chain, I still think that there should really be more of an emphasis of quality in food as opposed to quantity, but so called market forces have been primarily responsible for the bad standards in food production.

LOOOL!1!1!!

Protein to make them fatter faster, and in Canada and the US the practice of feeding them cow has stopped since 1997

It prob wasent the meat itself but how it was cooked, how the place handled its food and stuff. I cant taste any differene between Canadian and American beef and we use alot less stuff in ours then theres.

Has anyone here stopped driving, due to the relatively high risk of getting into an accident and dying?

While spectacular to worry about, I agree the true risk of developing vCJD is very low. Also agree that current farming practices are troubling and could use cleaning up.

I think there are more significant issues than BSE. I was watching a show that brought up a very good point about the blood supply system in North America- it isn't being tested for some very nasty and incurable diseases (the particular one being discussed was Chagas disease. This is IMO a more realistic worry.