25/11/2000 13:10 - (SA) Germany food chain already BSE-infected

Hamburg, Germany - Cattle infected with "mad cow" disease have already entered the food chain in Germany, according to a specialist quoted in Der Spiegel magazine in its issue due out on Monday.

The report follows a national stir sparked on Friday by the discovery of the first case of infection with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) of a German-born animal.

According to the Rotterdam virologist Albert Osterhaus, for every case of BSE discovered in Germany, one can statistically estimate that two others have escaped detection and been butchered and consumed.

Osterhaus, a member of the European Commission's scientific committee, told Spiegel that "several dozen" cattle infected with mad cow disease had in his opinion therefore entered the human food chain.

Other animals infected with BSE but not yet showing signs of disease were still alive in farm stalls, Osterhaus reckoned.

Eating BSE-infected meat is believed to cause a fatal brain-wasting illness in humans, variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD). More than 80 people are believed to have died from vCJD in Britain, where most mad cow cases have been discovered.

A first case of a German-born beef animal with BSE has been found in Schleswig-Holstein, while the Portuguese authorities say one case imported from Germany has been found on the Azores archipelago.

There were just six known cases of BSE in Germany between 1994 and 1997, but all these were in imported animals - six from Britain and one from Switzerland - and none since hitherto. - Sapa-AFP

http://news.24.com/News24/World/Europe/0,1113,2-10-19_945594,00.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), November 26, 2000

Answers

European beef anyone?

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), November 26, 2000.