Friday night's announcement that an animal possibly infected with mad cow diseas

[Guest guest]

Mon, 13 Jun 2005 02:25:29 -0400 (EDT)

 

" Consumer Affairs " <newsletter

CONSUMER NEWS & ALERTS, June 13, 2005

 

 

FRIDAY NIGHT BARBECUE

As we noted last week, it's an old government trick to release bad

news on Friday night, when it's likely to go unnoticed. Latest

example: Friday night's announcement that an animal possibly infected

with mad cow disease has been found in Texas. The U.S. Agriculture

Department missed it the first two times. It wasn't until the USDA's

Inspector General ordered a third test that the possible contamination

was found. Just to be clear what this is all about: eating meat from

an infected animal can cause Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, an invariably

fatal degenerative brain disorder that so far has claimed more than

150 lives, mostly in Britain.

 

Mad cow is thought to be spread when the remains of dead animals are

ground up and used as protein supplement in animal feed, effectively

turning grass-mulching ruminants into cannibals. Unlike bacterial

infections, the agent that causes mad cow is not destroyed by cooking,

washing or boiling. We have rounded up the latest data on this rather

depressing topic. After reading it, you may want to head for the tofu

counter.