[AgThorn]

For review, awareness and comment.... I did a quick scan to see if this was already posted and nothing this current was found.

[blam]

I thought this disease was always know to be in the wild herds out west?

[TrueBeliever9]

here we go..............

[GVnana]

Here it comes...

[strela]

Time to go ahead and get that side of beef for the freezer?

[MJY1288]

NewsMax = Unreliable, desperation, anything for a headline, and most of all Tin Foil hats

[AnnaZ]

ping

[MediaMole]

It's a similar disease, but not the same. It has been infecting captive herds of deer and elk in the west for several years. The fear is that it will spread to wild populations and move east.

[freefly]

fyi bump

[MJY1288]

AgThorn, Apparently zog feels I flamed you, but my post was aimed at NewsMax and not you, my apoligies if you took it as a flame or attack on you personally. IT WAS NOT

[Betty Jo]

Why dosnt anyone else ask this question...did the terrorists start the epidemic in Europe?

The same for Hoof and Mouth.

The terrorists have destroyed the airline industry,closed the stock market for days,killed thousands and thousands of financial workers , and cost eveyone in America billions and billions!

So, I will not be surprised when it is determined tht the terrorists are killing animals!

[dr_who]

DATED: January 19, 2001. NOT September. NOT October. JANUARY.

Another thing. I'd be be willing to bet that as of more than two years ago, BSE exists in its natural state somewhere in the U.S. Along with anthrax.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

Sounds like some of these guys are fighting over the last cheeseburger in the bag !

[dbbeebs]

U.S. Issues Declaration of Emergency for Mad Cow Disease

Interesting title, but the article has nothing to do about "mad cow" disease.

[VA Advogado]

Mad Cow or bioterrorism? You be the judge.

[Robert Lomax]

How do we know that this is not some form of bio-terrorism?

[t-shirt]

Mad Cow Scam = Operation wipe-out the farmers and destroy property rights.

[Sir Gawain]

William Cooper had an article about this in APRIL.

[Dick Bachert]

Not to make light of a serious health risk, but I thought it might be helpful for Freepers to be able to identify a MAD COW -- or Hillary at a Bush speech.

[Styria]

How is this thing spread through captive herds? Do they use feed there too that has cow or deer brains mixed in with everything else? And if that's the case, why would it matter if an animal with it gets out, since it isn't going to be eaten by another deer? Is it spread some other way once there? And do humans ever eat deer brains?

[Exit 109]

USDA link discussing CWD, BSE, and CJD here.

I remember doing some reading about BSE last spring when England had that last go 'round with hoof & mouth. If I remember correctly, the main points were:

1. The cows that had BSE got the disease from eating the leftovers of other infected animals in the form of bone meal added to their feed. As I recall, it was the spines and brains that contained the disease, recycled into bonemeal, that was responsible. For some reason, it has to come from tissue in the central nervous system.

2. There is great debate within the scientific community regarding just what the mechanism is that causes this series of diseases. Some think it's a virus, others an errant amino acid (I hope that's the correct way to describe it). Then there's another group of researchers who believe it's something called prions. A quick web search will bring up all manner of articles on that alone.

My 2 cents on all of this? I think it's more likely that the cases of vCJD seen in England have more to do with the parts of the cow that Europeans eat and we don't. (Not much demand for calf brain entrees on this side of the pond.)

I also think that there's way too much infighting in the research community as to the actual mechanism of these diseases for them to be man-made. Pretty difficult to manufacture mass quantities of something you can't exactly pinpoint.

In addition, the human incubation period is too long. Anywhere from 2-8 years, if at all. Seems to me that the goal of bio-warfare is to take out as many people as possible in a quick and scary manner.

Hopefully we have some scientists here who can explain this a little better than I attempted to.