BACK on March 8th Dr.Thorsberry had these remarks
Dr. Max Thornsberry, a Missouri veterinarian and president of the Missouri Stockgrowers Association, agrees with others that the USDA is rushing to reopen the border. He disagrees with the USDA's insistence that the period since trade was shut down has been enough to ensure an absence of BSE-infected animals, and as an affiliate with R-CALF USA is glad for the injunction put forth by Judge Cebull.
"The prions that cause BSE are basically indestructible," Thornsberry said. "Research has determined that prions buried for three years are still capable of causing disease when injected into laboratory animals. Cattle with BSE shed these prions in their feces, urine, nasal discharges, saliva and reproductive discharges, and these can easily contaminate soil in paddocks, lots, feeding pens and pastures."
With the incubation period of the disease being as slow as it is, Thornsberry believes there is still a high possibility of infected animals that have not yet become symptomatic. He believes these animals, if brought across the border, could pose a health risk to other livestock, and consumers.
According to a news release by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency on Feb. 11, it is "not likely that the (1997) feed ban was immediately adopted uniformly across the feed industry" and "the detection of an affected animal born after the feed ban was not unexpected".
The ban was put in place to eliminate the use of bovine meat and bone meal as feed for cattle -- feed that contains SRM's (specified risk materials). These are materials, including brain and spinal tissue and tongues, that are potentially BSE-positive. The CFIA news release said these prohibited materials would have been purged from the ruminant feed system as new operating processes were implemented and refined.
Thornsberry said that during this process, it is likely that BSE-positive materials lingered and found their way into non-infected animals.
He added that he is not against reopening the U.S./Canada border for cattle trade -- he just hopes the timing is right, and the preliminary injunction set forth by Cebull could allow for just that.
"Dr. Stanley Pruisner with the University of California in San Francisco was the first to discover BSE," Thornsberry said. "And he believes that within the next year or so he will have developed a blood test for live animals that will determine if they are infected or not."
The current method of determining whether or not an animal has the disease is to test samples of brain tissue after the animal has been slaughtered or destroyed.
"Knowing this, the USDA should not be willing to accept a minimal risk trade as they have said they will do," Thornsberry said. "When this test is available, it would become a zero risk trade."
Thornsberry went on to tell the News-Star that the test, once available, would probably cost no more than $20 per head.
"The USDA presented politically-based facts, while R-CALF USA presented scientifically-based facts," Thornsberry said of the organization's efforts to have the reopening postponed. "Thank goodness science won."
will R-CALF ever be held accountable for their statements that this letter writer said he witness. :???: Not by Porker and Mike they would rather divert and discredit, typical R-CALF behavior. :wink:
