By Mark Whitaker
I'm writing this article in regard to a June 13 Korea Times article, "Protesters Want a Better President,'' by columnist Michael Breen.
My first point is to agree: the protest have turned into a large anti-Lee Myung-bak demonstration over many of the President's policies. The first 100 days did show very clearly his leadership style, hardly different from his Bulldozer epithet hurled at him from his mayoralty of Seoul.
However, the protest's touchstone was hardly irrational opposition to U.S. beef. Probably a lot of Americans ― and many others worldwide ― have been killed due to American beef infected with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD). It may have been classified as Alzheimer's disease (that is exploding in the United States) instead of CJD.
There are few autopsies after Alzheimer's diagnoses/deaths ― truly to differentiate whether it really was Alzheimer's or CJD.
From the data we have, there have been some misdiagnoses made (from autopsy verified CJD once misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's; see the Neurology 1997 paper at the link https://www.mad-cow.org/alz_cjd.html).
My second point is that the meat lobby is very powerful in the United States. I assume they made the Alabama 2006 mad cow 'disappear' in a second test. No one asked how this was possible to do so, when they seem to trust a negative result more readily in the first test than a positive one?
They never do a second test on a negative result. This indicates that they consider the first tests very unreliable --only if it yields a positive result! How do we know that more of the first tests are not `false negatives' instead of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's claim of `false positives'? More information about the Alabama 2006 mad cow: https://www.naturalnews.com/z019383.html.
My third point is that there is a large revolving door in U.S. food regulation and corporations that make the food. This encourages corrupt forms of regulation instead of independent regimes of regulation.
The point is why trust them when they lie so much about nearly everything under the sun. Remember that just a few months ago in February 2008, the U.S. had its largest beef recall ever -- around 143 million pounds -- because a beef producer, Hallmark, had been caught by the U.S. Humane Society on secret video.
The U.S. beef processor, secretly and illegally, was processing at-risk `downer' cattle even though such practices were banned because they are more likely to transmit BSE into human food. Much of this tainted downer cow beef had already been eaten _ by schoolchildren.
More on this massive beef recall in February 2008 occurred right before the U.S. tried to argue that its beef is `safe' for the Korean market. This was the largest beef recall ever in the United States (https://www.naturalnews.com/z022666.html).
My fourth point is connected with the third point about the large revolving door. There is a lack of true regulation in the beef industry to catch mad cow when it is there. A regime of regulations has been set that tests less than 1 percent of U.S. cattle for mad cow.
Now, this means that when they do (accidentally) find a mad cow, like in Alabama in 2006, it can't be scientifically called an ``isolated" case of mad cow.
First, there is no such thing as an isolated case of BSE since the disease vectors to get it are social or in the shared feed.
It can come from the same feed that other cattle are eating, though those many other cattle remain untested, in the scientific dark.
Second, it can only be called an isolated case if we have data from all American cattle for mad cow. We don't have that data ― and from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's point of view they don't want to ever create such data. The USDA is hostile to setting up a regulatory regime for creating this data.
Data about U.S. mad cow prevalence (based on knowing about all cows ― and we don't have that data) currently available is not grounds for arguing American beef safety. However it is using this lack of data that the USDA places its argument ― not a lack of mad cow.
If we don't test a lot of cows, we won't find much mad cow. It's that simple. And when we do we `retest' after finding mad cow, we call it a `false positive' and say everything is fine. Is it? This `less than 1 percent testing,' ― and then burying the evidence when we find it ― is the recipe for labeling U.S. beef safe?
Such perverse illogic that animates the U.S. ``regulatory" system for beef I would not bet my long-term mental health on. I could not ask Koreans (or anyone else for that matter) to trust this strange regulatory regime around beef in the Unites States.
It is a regulatory regime full of holes. The systemic things I have discussed in this short letter are social proof of problems with the U.S. regulatory apparatus around beef. Therefore, I don't think the characterization of protesters as irrational is accurate.
It remains to be seen whether the May 2008 attempt in the United States to ban downer cattle really has administrative pressure, or is just a symbolic statement hoping to placate the public while it was in the news due to the undercover reporting of the U.S. Humane Society that showed illegal downer cattle being fork-lifted into the `healthy' line for processing.
How do we get all the data on the U.S. mad cows? We test all American cattle. It's that simple. Create a trusted product and everyone will want to buy it. However, the USDA has banned a U.S. meatpacking company, Creekstone Farms, from testing all their own cattle like the Japanese consumers want.
Creekstone wants to sell its beef to the Japanese that have a much better regulatory regime than the United States for catching BSE. Watch the Creekstone Farms' lawsuit against the USDA to understand the underhanded politics of beef regulation in the United States.
In conclusion, currently in the United States a lack of testing and lack of data is utilized to argue falsely there is `no proof' of mad cow. They are right ― there is intentionally no data to argue with one way or the other.
For the USDA no data gathered equals no proof of mad cow? Hardly. A lack of data is proof of nothing.
The only way for the U.S. to assure to the world it has safe beef is to test every cow like the Japanese already do.
Moreover, since 2005, other pathways of mad cow/BSE besides spines and bones have been noted: human-to-human transmission has been noted as well.
Science is always updated and partial. I suggest that a bit of humility goes a long way for all of us toward expanding understanding of this complicated issue.
Multiple pathways are involved in BSE/CJD transmission ― more pathways than the regulatory people want to talk about in these disease vectors.
One can find a nice summary of the strange U.S. (non) regulatory regime around beef, particularly the last section of the article at https://mwcnews.net/content/view/23201&Itemid=1.
Mark Whitaker is a professor of environmental sociology at Ewha Womans University in Seoul. He can be reached at mwhitaker@ewha.ac.kr.