Mike
Well-known member
USDA Tried to Derail BSE Tests of Infected Cow
February 7, 2006
Any illusion that the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is putting public safety first – as opposed to preserving its own bureaucratic systems and procedures – was shattered last week by a Washington Post article saying that the USDA "overruled field scientists' recommendation to retest an animal that was suspected of harboring mad cow disease last year because they feared a positive finding would undermine confidence in the agency's testing procedures," the department's inspector general said yesterday.
"After protests from the inspector general, the specimen was sent to England for retesting and produced the nation's second confirmed case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), also known as mad cow disease."
The Post report was based on an internal USDA audit designed to evaluate the agency's performance in dealing with mad cow disease.
According to the story, "scientists at the National Veterinary Services Laboratories concluded that a sample from a Texas animal should be tested with other techniques following initial inconclusive findings," but that "top officials at the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) told them not to do the additional tests.
"When officials from the inspector general's office met with the head of APHIS, they were told that the protocol followed by the agency was the international 'gold standard' and nothing more was needed, the report adds. Nonetheless, the sample was later sent to England for a different set of tests and was found to have the mad cow infection."
It gets worse. "The report also found that although there was no evidence that infected meat had made it into the human food chain, the USDA surveillance system did not collect the information needed to say whether slaughterhouses were following all mad cow-related regulations," the Post writes.
USDA food safety administrator Barbara J. Masters released a statement saying that officials have taken steps to better enforce the rules and have reached agreement with the inspector general on most issues. 'FSIS is confident it is successfully carrying out its mission to protect public health by strictly enforcing safeguards,' she said.
This is the same Barbara Masters who said in an interview late last year:
"[T]he Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, ... have done a very outstanding job in the surveillance program for BSE in the United States. And they have tested well over 400,000 samples here in the United States over the last 18 months or so looking for BSE in the United States and they have done an incredible job of finding those animals most at risk for BSE in the United States. And through that testing process I think you're well aware that here in the United States we have found two animals with BSE. And so I think the criticism has decreased here in the United States because of the enhanced surveillance program and the robust system that our sister agency put in place to ensure that we're testing all regions of the country and all parts of the country with this very enhanced surveillance program put in place by our sister agency."
Barbara Masters may be confident that the agency "is successfully carrying out its mission to protect public health by strictly enforcing safeguards." But she's alone, or only accompanied by fellow bureaucrats more concerned with agency protocols than with preserving the safety of the consumers and taxpayers who pay their salaries and who trust them. There is absolutely no reason they should have any credibility on any other issue. They make lousy decision, they lie, they cover up. Just what you want from your government.
February 7, 2006
Any illusion that the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is putting public safety first – as opposed to preserving its own bureaucratic systems and procedures – was shattered last week by a Washington Post article saying that the USDA "overruled field scientists' recommendation to retest an animal that was suspected of harboring mad cow disease last year because they feared a positive finding would undermine confidence in the agency's testing procedures," the department's inspector general said yesterday.
"After protests from the inspector general, the specimen was sent to England for retesting and produced the nation's second confirmed case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), also known as mad cow disease."
The Post report was based on an internal USDA audit designed to evaluate the agency's performance in dealing with mad cow disease.
According to the story, "scientists at the National Veterinary Services Laboratories concluded that a sample from a Texas animal should be tested with other techniques following initial inconclusive findings," but that "top officials at the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) told them not to do the additional tests.
"When officials from the inspector general's office met with the head of APHIS, they were told that the protocol followed by the agency was the international 'gold standard' and nothing more was needed, the report adds. Nonetheless, the sample was later sent to England for a different set of tests and was found to have the mad cow infection."
It gets worse. "The report also found that although there was no evidence that infected meat had made it into the human food chain, the USDA surveillance system did not collect the information needed to say whether slaughterhouses were following all mad cow-related regulations," the Post writes.
USDA food safety administrator Barbara J. Masters released a statement saying that officials have taken steps to better enforce the rules and have reached agreement with the inspector general on most issues. 'FSIS is confident it is successfully carrying out its mission to protect public health by strictly enforcing safeguards,' she said.
This is the same Barbara Masters who said in an interview late last year:
"[T]he Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, ... have done a very outstanding job in the surveillance program for BSE in the United States. And they have tested well over 400,000 samples here in the United States over the last 18 months or so looking for BSE in the United States and they have done an incredible job of finding those animals most at risk for BSE in the United States. And through that testing process I think you're well aware that here in the United States we have found two animals with BSE. And so I think the criticism has decreased here in the United States because of the enhanced surveillance program and the robust system that our sister agency put in place to ensure that we're testing all regions of the country and all parts of the country with this very enhanced surveillance program put in place by our sister agency."
Barbara Masters may be confident that the agency "is successfully carrying out its mission to protect public health by strictly enforcing safeguards." But she's alone, or only accompanied by fellow bureaucrats more concerned with agency protocols than with preserving the safety of the consumers and taxpayers who pay their salaries and who trust them. There is absolutely no reason they should have any credibility on any other issue. They make lousy decision, they lie, they cover up. Just what you want from your government.
