Mad Cows and Englishmen, and Americans.

[Guest guest]

[Even though this particular article was written in

2001, it's still relevant as the U.S. GOV is still

practicing their 'don't look, don't find' policy.

Rick.]

 

 

mad cows and englishmen (and Americans)

 

by Gabe Kirchheimer (GKHG) - February 25, 2001

 

 

This updated version of an article by Gabe Kirchheimer

originally appeared in the July 2000 issue of High

Times magazine, the second in a series on Mad Cow

disease in the USA. His first article on the topic,

the first to be published in a large national

magazine, appeared in the January 1998 High Times.

Many of the allegations contained in these articles

have recently been confirmed by the FDA and other

agencies, and reported by the New York Times, CNN and

other national media.

Does Mad Cow disease represent a worldwide pestilence

affecting many species of animals and millions of

people? Is CJD the world's most dangerous disease? Is

unsafe animal feed creating the most devastating

epidemic since AIDS?

 

'Are you familiar with CJD? Welcome to a living hell.

Take a brief walk with me while I tell you of the most

horrifying disease known to mankind.'

~ ~ Dolly Campbell, whose husband died of

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.

 

Mad Cows In The USA

 

Mad Cow disease has turned Britain on its head. Even

as the number of infected cattle in the United Kingdom

has been reduced-over 180,000 cases have been

confirmed, nearly four million cows have been

destroyed-the likelihood of widespread human infection

has increased. The disease, bovine spongiform

encephalopathy (BSE) in cows and Creutzfeldt-Jakob

disease (CJD) in humans, literally destroys the brain,

filling its tissue with spongy holes. The growing

number of British victims of " new variant " CJD, mostly

young people in their prime who contracted the brain

sickness from tainted meat, is a grim precursor to an

uncertain future. Consumption of British beef has

plummeted; financial losses have been catastrophic. An

exhaustive report, released by the official UK BSE

Inquiry last summer, traced the history of the

continuing epidemic and confirmed the negligence of

the authorities.

 

Mad Cows have now been found in France, Italy,

Belgium, Switzerland, Ireland, Spain, Holland,

Portugal, Denmark, Luxembourg, Brazil and Canada. The

US Department of Agriculture maintains that no Mad

Cows exist here, and has tested nearly 12,000 bovine

brains in the last decade-of 1.25 billion cattle

raised in that period-and found not a single case of

the British variant of Mad Cow disease. It is

primarily this data upon which the agency bases their

denials.

 

But what strains of the disease is the USDA looking

for? Would the USDA actually alert the world if they

found BSE in their laboratory, therefore precipitating

the kind of panic seen in the UK and Europe?

 

The stakes are extremely high. One infected animal,

whose remains are " rendered, " powdered and mixed into

feed, can infect thousands of other animals, and the

thousands of people who eat them.

 

Leading food-safety advocates question the agency's

small test sample, methodology and motives. They point

out that USDA scientists are not likely to find the

British variant of Mad Cow because, in fact, US cattle

are likely infected with an entirely different

strain-or strains-of BSE. Similar Transmissible

Spongiform Encephalopathies (TSEs), or " prion

diseases, " such as scrapie (with 20 strains, and found

in 45 US states) and Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD),

have been found in populations of American sheep,

goats, deer, elk, mink, and squirrels. The deadly

infection is acquired through contaminated feed and

maternal transmission, and probably from contaminated

areas and through close proximity of animals to one

another.

 

Mad People

 

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the human TSE, is still

considered so rare-the medical literature states only

one in a million cases of " classic " CJD occurs in

humans-that few doctors and neurologists even

recognize the symptoms, which are frequently

misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's disease. CJD robs victims

of lucidity, control and life over a period ranging

from six months to three years from the onset of

symptoms, which can take from 10 to 40 years to

manifest.

 

Like all TSEs, CJD is 100% fatal. There is no

treatment or cure.

 

As no blood test for the living is available, CJD has

been definitively diagnosed only through brain biopsy.

The US Centers for Disease Control has repeatedly

refused to mandate CJD-unlike HIV and many other

diseases-as reportable. With stories of CJD cases

increasing, support groups have sprung up around the

country and on the Web to demand action.

 

The US Department of Agriculture sees no reason to

advise the public at this time that eating US beef or

pork constitutes a significant risk of infection with

CJD, acquired from animals with TSEs. Neither does the

USDA warn against other risks such as blood meal or

horticultural bone meal [see sidebar below], which can

be easily inhaled or enter the body through the eyes,

a direct route to the brain. The FDA has only recently

communicated that numerous drugs and dietary

supplements containing bovine ingredients, perhaps

even gelatin capsules themselves, and cosmetics which

include collagen and tallow are at uncertain risk of

carrying the infectious agent-a nearly indestructible

mutant protein known as a " prion " -which apparently

causes CJD and other TSEs.

 

Neither have US doctors, surgeons and dentists been

notified that surgical instruments are at highest risk

of transmitting the infection, as standard autoclave

sterilization does not neutralize infectious prions.

Blood, blood products, bovine extracts and transplant

organs are not screened for CJD in the US, although

around the world infected organ recipients, who

developed symptoms sometimes decades after treatment,

have been traced to infected donors.

 

See No Evil, Here No Evil

 

Lack of government action is based on the

assumption-or deception-that the United States is

completely free of Mad Cow disease, other domesticated

animals are equally unaffected, and that only the very

rare " classic " strain of CJD, which primarily affects

the elderly, and not British nvCJD or another strain,

exists here. In actuality, a careful reading of the

evidence indicates Mad Cows-as well as Mad sheep, deer

and elk-roam the land, and the incidence of human CJD

is exponentially higher than the Centers for Disease

Control has made clear. Several key studies show it is

likely that tens or even hundreds of thousands of

people are dying right now of undiagnosed or

misdiagnosed CJD.

 

Article continues here >

http://www.disinfo.com/archive/pages/article/id906/pg1/index.html

 

Plus more info on Mad Cow Disease >

http://www.disinfo.com/archive/pages/dossier/id930/pg1/index.html