Mad cow disease

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1996:

British domestic
beef sales on May 14 were
back to 94% of their premad
cow disease scare
level, and prices were at
92%, said the British Meat
and Livestock Commission.
The scare began on
March 27, when scientists
told Commons that bovine
encephalopathy (BSE) may
be related to a new strain of
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease,
notable for afflicting young
victims; CJD had been
viewed as a disease of age.
In the interim, fish sales
rose 25%, while pork and
lamb sales were up 9%.
Beef consumption fell 28%
and prices fell 43%.

George Luterbach,
DVM, Agriculture
Canada manager of animal
health for Saskatchewan
and Manitoba, announced
on April 29 that 24 elk
were slaughtered on a
Saskatchewan ranch after
one of them developed
symptoms of a disease
resembling BSE––which
has never been detected in
North America.
Stephanie Breitkopf,
24, on life support
in Macedon, New York,
after a six-year battle with
an unidentified braindestroying
disease, has
been tentatively identified
as a U.S. CJD victim who
definitely ate beef of
British origin in 1987, at
the height of the BSE epidemic
on British farms.
Four new cases
of apparent BSE-linked
CJD have been reported in
Britain, joining 10 already
on record. A 15-year-old
girl is so far the youngest
apparent victim; CJD can
be confirmed only by an
autopsy.
Britain has
begun slaughtering a l l
cattle who were alive in the
peak years of the BSE epidemic.
As many as
100,000 cattle must be
killed to satisfy European
Union requirements for
formally lifting restrictions
on British beef imports.
The European
U n i o n has budgeted $1.07
billion to contend with
BSE during fiscal 1997.