Stop factory farming and end BSE, UK scientists say
LONDON, Dec 4 (Reuters) - UK scientists urged Europe on Monday to
help farmers move away from intensive agriculture, saying the end of
factory farming was the only way to kill off mad cow disease. The
scientists, who advised and criticised the UK government at the
height of Britain's mad cow crisis, told EU farm ministers that tests
for bovine spongiform encephalopathy were not sensitive enough to
guarantee BSE-free beef. ``Action needs to be taken now to initiate
plans for the genuine long-term eradication of BSE,'' the three
scientists said in a letter to European Union food safety
Commissioner David Byrne. ``We would urge that the EU should both
promote, and provide substantial funding for an expansion of
extensive and organic systems of beef production...and a scaling down
of industrially farmed beef throughout Europe.'' EU farm ministers
were meeting in Brussels to decide how to curb the spread of the
brain-wasting disease, considering a ban on all meat-based livestock
feed and measures to keep older cattle out of the food chain unless
tested for BSE.
But Iain McGill, who worked for the Agriculture Ministry at the
height of Britain's crisis, Stephen Dealler, who has worked on BSE
since 1988, and Adrian Holmes, a lobbyist on the matter, warned the
EU that a wide cattle cull and increased testing may not halt the
disease's spread. ``The current tests for BSE would not appear to be
sufficiently sensitive to guarantee that beef is BSE-free,'' they
said, adding that false negative results could allow high-risk cattle
tissues back into the food chain. ``Regarding the culling of cattle
it must be worth flagging up the enormous problems with the disposal
of cattle carcasses in the UK.'' They said a widespread cattle cull
could also expose people to BSE from the carcasses -- whether eaten
or not -- through environmental contamination.
``There is currently no safe and satisfactory route for disposal of
carcasses which is also logistically feasible on such a large
scale,'' they said. Europe should also adopt France's ban on the
tissues most susceptible to the disease, including the ileum and
thymus. Moreover, Europe should fund research for a cure to BSE and
its human equivalent, new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease. But to
end the spread and kill off the disease, Europe has to start farming
in a different way, they said. ``The German Chancellor Gerhard
Schroeder is calling for the end of factory farming,'' they said.
``The UK BSE inquiry also came to the conclusion that BSE was a
product of intensive agriculture -- a 'recipe for disaster'.''
Copyright 1999 Reuters Limited.