Here come the SHARKS!

[Mike]

"The Administration's response to mad cow disease appears to be more public relations than public health," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif. "The Agriculture Department now says it's taking aggressive steps, but just a few weeks ago the department was talking about easing the ban on downer cattle in the food supply and sharply reducing mad cow surveillance.

"Congress must investigate what went wrong, and the administration must finally enforce strong measures to protect against mad cow disease," he said.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

[Clarence]

Now is the time to become less emotional and look more squarely at the facts.

The Gold standard test that we had been using, and probably still are using, is still quite reliable. After all it did show this cow to be a suspect positive.

Only after using very intensive measures and another test did she show up as a positive. There may still be a question as if she really did have BSE, but we shouldn't try to rely on that. She was a downer, we also can not say that the disease was not far enough advanced to show a good positive test.

 

[Mike]

Now is the time to become less emotional and look more squarely at the facts.

The Gold standard test that we had been using, and probably still are using, is still quite reliable. After all it did show this cow to be a suspect positive.

Only after using very intensive measures and another test did she show up as a positive. There may still be a question as if she really did have BSE, but we shouldn't try to rely on that. She was a downer, we also can not say that the disease was not far enough advanced to show a good positive test.

Try the "less emotional" story on the press and see if they bite. This is a true comedy of errors for the USDA.
Clarence, the cow tested positive using the IHC, WB, SAF, and Histopathology, in England. There is no doubt as to the infectivity. All other countries in Europe plus Japan and Canada use the WB plus IHC for confirmatory tests after a rapid is positive. EITHER/OR can be positive and is confirmed.
"Intensive measures"? Concentrating samples is common practice in Western Blot technology, that's why it can find prions in subclinical cases (younger animals).
Testing has become a "Food Safety Issue" here as it has been in Europe, like it or not. Even though the USDA disagrees.

 

[STAFF]

"Congress must investigate what went wrong, and the administration must finally enforce strong measures to protect against mad cow disease," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif.
Maybe the US can get to the foggy bottum of USDA.