Agriculture

Did Mad Deer/Elk Disease Come From Scrapie-Infected Sheep?

The Rocky Mountain News reports that a Colorado "Division of Wildlife biologist believes a nutritional study he conducted with deer, sheep and goats in the late 1960s might have been the genesis of chronic wasting disease. Gene Schoonveld suspects some of the sheep in his study had scrapie, a relative of chronic wasting disease. Some of the deer might have become infected with scrapie, which then mutated into CWD and spread to other deer. ...

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Mad Deer/Elk Disease Is Spreading

The Denver Post reports that "Sixty-three elk exposed to chronic wasting disease (CWD) at a Del Norte ranch were exported to at least five states and three other Colorado ranches... Chronic wasting disease is ... related to mad cow disease. Unlike that disease, it has not been shown to infect humans." That's one spin to put on this issue, but the fact is that there is also no proof that CWD cannot infect humans, and laboratory evidence indicates that it might.

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"Beef Party" Held To Boost Japanese Consumer Confidence

Following the first confirmed case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) or mad cow disease in Japan last month, Japan's meat industry has launched a campaign to reassure Japanese consumers of the safety of Japanese beef. Over 100 politicians were invited to a "beef party" to eat Japanese produced beef.

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Idaho Officials Cancel Speech Fearing Anti-Ag Message

MeatingPlace.com, which describes itself as "the premiere information provider for the red meat and poultry industries," reports that "An Oct. 3 'Success Breakfast,' sponsored by the College of Southern Idaho and the Twin Falls, Idaho, Chamber of Commerce and featuring activist Jeremy Rifkin, has been cancelled after officials became worried he might make negative comments about beef and milk, according to The Associated Press.

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Just Ignore Mad Elk, It's Bad For Business

In an industry-friendly puff piece bragging that Minnesota is the nation's number one producer of farmed elk used for food and "health supplements," Minneapolis Star Tribune reporter Joy Powell makes no mention of Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), the mad cow-type illness devastating elk and deer in western states and spreading across North America through virtually unregulated trafficking among game farms. CWD is already suspected in the cases of a number of young people in the US who have died in the last few years from CJD, the human equivalent of mad cow and mad elk disease.

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"Beef Up BSE Spending" Says Panel At Edelman Forum

A panel of former government officials, food industry executives and a consumer advocate Friday called on the U.S. government to increase funding for agencies fighting to keep bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or Mad Cow from entering this country. During the BSE Symposium, held in Washington D.C. and sponsored by Edelman Public Relations, former U.S. Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, now a partner at the DC-based law firm, Akin, Gump, said the U.S.

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Price Fixer to the World Seeks New Image

Archer Daniels Midland Company, seeking a more wholesome image, replaced its longtime slogan "Supermarket to the World" with the touchingly eco-friendly tag "The Nature of What's to Come." ADM has reason to be concerned about its public profile; the feds have convicted the agri-business giant of multiple counts of price-fixing, multiple states have taken it to court for pollution-related issues, and political reformers say ADM has reaped massive government pork from heavy soft money donations.

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The 'Mad' Disease Has Many Forms

PR Watch staffers Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber wrote Mad Cow USA in 1997. This report by the chemical industry's official publication does a very good job of updating developments since then. "Has the U.S. government taken sufficient measures to keep it from infecting humans?" asks reporter Bette Hileman. "For years after BSE first appeared in Britain, authorities believed the disease would not spread beyond the U.K. They also believed it would not jump species to infect humans. ... They were wrong.

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