Sludge Watch ==> Industry exerts pressure to delay Canadian BSE food / feed/ fert safety regs

[maureen.reilly at sympatico.ca]

Sludgewatch Admin:

The use of bovine brain and spinal cord in pet food and animal feed and fish 
feed is a huge risk. Its use as 'fertilizer'...is also dangerous.

The pet food issue is shocking.  BSE risk material in the kitty food 
dish...?
How many babies and toddlers snack from the kitty kibble bowl?

Lots

The rendering, feed, and fertilizer industries are pushing the Canadian 
gov't to delay implementation of the proposed legislation to prohibit BSE 
risk materials in animal feed, pet feed, and fertilizer.  A delay would mean 
that Canadians could not assure world markets that Canadian feed and 
fertilizer is European grade BSE free.  We will lose those markets.  Hardly 
a good idea.

Hmmm...we also delayed the removal of HIV and Hepatitus C infected blood in 
the Canadian blood supply.  That delay didn't work out well.

........................................................................................

  The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon) 2006


Feed ban no-brainer: expert

Feds pressured to 'harmonize' on high-risk tissues
Margaret Munro, CanWest News Service
Published: Thursday, June 08, 2006

VANCOUVER -- The federal government is being pressured to wait for American 
action before banning the use of cattle brains, corpses and other 
"high-risk" material in animal feed, pet food and fertilizer to prevent the 
spread of mad-cow disease.

"There has been a lot of pushback from industry, they want to harmonize with 
the Americans," says Dr. Graham Clarke, director of the animal industry 
division at Agriculture and Agri-food Canada.

He told a meeting on brain-wasting diseases here this week the government 
"is obviously listening" to the arguments and couldn't say when the 
longawaited ban would go into force.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency announced in 2004 it would follow 
Europe's lead and ban use of "specifi ed risk material," or SRM, in animal 
feed and fertilizer. SRM includes condemned cattle and dead stock, as well 
as the brains, spinal cords, tonsils, eyeballs and bits of small intestine 
from cattle that can harbour high concentrations of prions, the infectious 
agents that cause bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), known as mad cow 
disease.

Clarke said Agri-food Canada has consulted with the provinces and industry, 
produced a detailed plan for collecting and handling SRMs and the government 
has allocated $80 million to help implement the ban.

But he couldn't say when the government would enact the legislation to end 
the use of SRM in feed -- a ban consumer groups and leading scientists say 
is long overdue.

"In my opinion, the enhanced feed ban should be instituted as soon as 
possible," says Dr. Neil Cashman, scientifi c director of PrioNet Canada, a 
research network studying prion diseases such as BSE.

He's echoed by several scientists, including a leading U.S. expert on BSE.

"Canada has to do what is important for Canada, to protect Canada," Dr.

Linda Detwiler, of the University of Maryland, told the meeting.

She said in an interview that eliminating diseased cattle and high-risk 
organs from the animal food chain is scientifi - cally sound, and the U.S. 
should introduce a similar ban.

"The U.S. needs to follow Canada's lead," said Detwiler.

Canada currently has a partial ban on the use of cattle slaughter waste. In 
1997, the government banned the feeding of cattle remains back to cattle and 
other ruminants, but it still allows cattle remains and SRMs to be used in 
feed for chickens, hogs and pets.

There's concern and evidence that cross-contamination of feed streams can 
contribute to the spread of the infectious and persistent prions that cause 
BSE. At the urging of an international team of animal health experts, CFIA, 
in 2004, proposed the SRM ban.

Clarke told the meeting it would be ideal if Canada and the U.S. could ban 
use of SRM at the same time since so much livestock and feed crosses the 
border.

Canada has uncovered fi ve homegrown cases of mad cow disease so far, and 
the United States has reported three cases.

While there have been no trade sanctions resulting from the two Canadian 
cases to turn up this year, earlier cases provoked U.S. and Japanese 
embargoes on imports of Canadian cows and beef that cost Canada's cattle 
farmers billions before they were lifted last year.

The most recent Canadian case of BSE was in a dairy cow in B.C. in April.

The possibility of cross-contamination of feed is being examined as a 
possible source of the infection.