If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. |
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#101
|
|||
|
|||
|
#103
|
|||
|
|||
From: (Steve Crane)
(Meghan Noecker) wrote in message ... I really believe that most of these problems would not exist, if all down cows were put down humanely on the spot, a sample taken for testing, and the rest of the cow destroyed with no usage whatsoever. Yes, it would be a loss financially, but I would rather pay higher prices for meat and products and cover that farmers' costs of doing bsuiness, than risk a sick animal being put into the food system. If the animal is sick enough to warrant testing, then it should be considered a loss. As it is, they go into the system, and end up spreading the problem. Meghan, I concurr with your idea of simply destroying the downer cows. I agree that I would be willing to pay marginally higher prices for the beef. Unfortunately the real world situation is that a significant percentage of the beef consumed in this country comes from outside the borders of this country, where the use of downer cows in neither regulated nor stopped. What you would be doing is putting the American rancher at an increased financial disadvantage again. The American rancher already pays significantly more for every part of the costs of production, from wormers to fencing to labor, all these costs are much higher here than in Bolivia or Argentina or Brazil. Neither are they supported by government funding as they are in Canada. The average consumer isn't going to care - if they have a choice between hamburger at $1.00 a pound or hamburger at $1.05 per pound they will buy the cheaper meat. While you and I may be willing to pay additional amounts for beef, most people won't and thus the rancher once again takes an economic loss. The use of downer cows in pet foods poses no real danger to pets. You have to think about the difference between "possibility" and "probability". Yes it is possible the moon will crash into the earth, but it is not probable anytime in the next milllion years or so, especially since it is slowly moving away. It is extremely remotely possible that a downer cow will escape detection as the one in Mabton did, but it is not probable that it will cause any harm to any pets. I find it extremely frustrating that so much "bandwidth" is being used to discuss extremely remote possibilities as if there was any real and present danger and yet real animal disease like renal failure is totally ignored. Where's the outcry over excessive levels of phosphorus in foods? Where are the screaming displays of outrage at excessive levels of sodium in pet foods? These things are real dangers that really cause pet deaths in this country. Meghan, FYI Steve Crane works for the pet food company Hill's. I'm sure Steve meant to let you know that Lauren ________ See my cats: http://community.webshots.com/album/56955940rWhxAe Raw Diet Info: http://www.holisticat.com/drjletter.html http://www.geocities.com/rawfeeders/ForCatsOnly.html Declawing Info: http://www.wholecat.com/articles/claws.htm |
#104
|
|||
|
|||
|
#105
|
|||
|
|||
|
#106
|
|||
|
|||
Hagar wrote:
humans, too. And they're probably right - I'm not aware of any human cases in either the USA or Canada. Hope that makes the meat industry feel better as they absorb that $17 billion loss. Yeah. Honestly I think Mad Cow's biggest impact on the US is not going to be health wise but economy wise. There has been (including the England epidemic which constitutes most of the cases) around 150 (I think the exact number was 153 but I'm not sure, could be 163) cases ever of the syndrom that is caused by injesting the prion. There is the same syndrom that is caused by genetics or even just random occurance. It is also very rare. Of course, with the way Mad Cow is spread, one could point out it would be very easy to get rid of it and have pretty much 100% safety from it. Feed cows what htey were meant to be fed, herbivore food. From what is described of the disease, I'm not sure if it would be totally 100% (could be that it can randomly occur when a protien turns into a prion), but it would be a lot closer than any other measures we put into place. Of course beef would become more expensive (even fast food hamburgers). But, I think really what needs to be addressed is other countries fear of our beef now. To be fair, ti sounds hypocritical to say that we were not allowing beef from countries with incidences into our country and then to try to get other countries to take our beef. But, at least in Japan's case it's not as if Japan hadn't already had an incident of it (they had two cows found to have it). When we weren't allowing beef in we never had a case of it. I can understand not wanting to risk getting it when you've never had it. I think though Japanese culture probably is more picky about what goes in their meal (it seems meal and presentation is very important. Not that I claim to know much about Japanese culture, it's just the impression I get). Also to address the idea that other countries test every single cattle... other countries have a lot smaller herd of cattle than we do (America eats a lot more beef and has a lot more land to grow that beef than most other countries where beef is more of a luxury). I would venture to say it is impractical to ask every single cow get tested before slaughtered and the meat eaten for this country, especially when you consider the risk which really isn't that big. I think maybe it would be fair for Japan to ask that any cattle/beef we import there get tested. Even the epidemic in England wasn't that many. More kids go into the hospital for cancer everyday than total amount of people who have gotten diagnosed with Varient Jacob's xxx syndrom (I cna't spell that one word, the varient is the jacob's xxx syndrom that is caused by eating a mad cow). I'm not sure from what I've read that it is gaurenteed you will develop the disease if you ingest the prion. As some one has pointed out they would do the public's health a lot better favor by focusing on safe meat handling to prevent salmanella and that kind of stuff. It probably affected England's culture and how they viewed beef more than their health. It is the perfect disease for the media. It is 100% fatal, it has a nice horrid description (how it affects the brain, the symptoms), and it's odd (specially the whole idea of a prion). Alice -- The root cause of problems is simple overpopulation. People just aren't worth very much any more, and they know it. Makes 'em testy. ...Bev |\ _,,,---,,_ Tigress /,`.-'`' -. ;-;;,_ http://havoc.gtf.gatech.edu/tigress |,4- ) )-,_..;\ ( `'-' '---''(_/--' `-'\_) Cat by Felix Lee. |
#107
|
|||
|
|||
Hagar wrote:
humans, too. And they're probably right - I'm not aware of any human cases in either the USA or Canada. Hope that makes the meat industry feel better as they absorb that $17 billion loss. Yeah. Honestly I think Mad Cow's biggest impact on the US is not going to be health wise but economy wise. There has been (including the England epidemic which constitutes most of the cases) around 150 (I think the exact number was 153 but I'm not sure, could be 163) cases ever of the syndrom that is caused by injesting the prion. There is the same syndrom that is caused by genetics or even just random occurance. It is also very rare. Of course, with the way Mad Cow is spread, one could point out it would be very easy to get rid of it and have pretty much 100% safety from it. Feed cows what htey were meant to be fed, herbivore food. From what is described of the disease, I'm not sure if it would be totally 100% (could be that it can randomly occur when a protien turns into a prion), but it would be a lot closer than any other measures we put into place. Of course beef would become more expensive (even fast food hamburgers). But, I think really what needs to be addressed is other countries fear of our beef now. To be fair, ti sounds hypocritical to say that we were not allowing beef from countries with incidences into our country and then to try to get other countries to take our beef. But, at least in Japan's case it's not as if Japan hadn't already had an incident of it (they had two cows found to have it). When we weren't allowing beef in we never had a case of it. I can understand not wanting to risk getting it when you've never had it. I think though Japanese culture probably is more picky about what goes in their meal (it seems meal and presentation is very important. Not that I claim to know much about Japanese culture, it's just the impression I get). Also to address the idea that other countries test every single cattle... other countries have a lot smaller herd of cattle than we do (America eats a lot more beef and has a lot more land to grow that beef than most other countries where beef is more of a luxury). I would venture to say it is impractical to ask every single cow get tested before slaughtered and the meat eaten for this country, especially when you consider the risk which really isn't that big. I think maybe it would be fair for Japan to ask that any cattle/beef we import there get tested. Even the epidemic in England wasn't that many. More kids go into the hospital for cancer everyday than total amount of people who have gotten diagnosed with Varient Jacob's xxx syndrom (I cna't spell that one word, the varient is the jacob's xxx syndrom that is caused by eating a mad cow). I'm not sure from what I've read that it is gaurenteed you will develop the disease if you ingest the prion. As some one has pointed out they would do the public's health a lot better favor by focusing on safe meat handling to prevent salmanella and that kind of stuff. It probably affected England's culture and how they viewed beef more than their health. It is the perfect disease for the media. It is 100% fatal, it has a nice horrid description (how it affects the brain, the symptoms), and it's odd (specially the whole idea of a prion). Alice -- The root cause of problems is simple overpopulation. People just aren't worth very much any more, and they know it. Makes 'em testy. ...Bev |\ _,,,---,,_ Tigress /,`.-'`' -. ;-;;,_ http://havoc.gtf.gatech.edu/tigress |,4- ) )-,_..;\ ( `'-' '---''(_/--' `-'\_) Cat by Felix Lee. |
#108
|
|||
|
|||
|
#109
|
|||
|
|||
|
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Before commercial cat food..... | Kitten M | Cat health & behaviour | 716 | October 18th 03 02:04 AM |