USDA Being Sued by Cattle Owners Over Risk of Mad Cow Disease (BSE)

A statement released by PR Newswire states that at least 10 plaintiffs have filed a law suit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture in South Dakota. The complaint was filed in an attempt to stop the agency from opening the Canadian border to imported beef.

Under the current decision, live cattle that were born after March 1, 1999, and beef that is over 30 months old, will be allowed into the U.S. The decision is sometimes called the OTM or over 30 month rule, and it is supposed to start on November 19th.

The concern with cattle farmers in the U.S. is that it would increase risk of bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE (mad cow disease). There have been eleven cases in Canada, and seven of those were since the January of 2006.

The plaintiffs filing the suit include Herman Schumacher, Robert Mack, Ernie Mertz, and Wayne Nelson, all of which are South Dakota cattle producers. The suit also includes the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association, the Center for Food Safety, the Creutzfeldt-Jakob, Disease Foundation, Food and Water Watch, Public Citizen (membership of 90,000), and the Consumer Federation of America (membership 50 million).

"The OTM rule creates an unjustified and unnecessary increased risk of infection of the U.S. cattle herd with BSE, and of importing beef contaminated with BSE (mad cow disease) into the U.S., which will expose U.S. consumers to increased risk of a fatal disease," said R-CALF USA CEO Bill Bullard. "By USDA's own analysis, it is a virtual certainty that the OTM Rule will result in the importation of Canadian cattle infected with BSE, the meat from which will enter the U.S. food supply, and that the OTM Rule also will result in the importation of billions of pounds of meat from OTM cattle slaughtered in Canada, which almost certainly include products from cattle infected with BSE. There also lies the possibility of contamination of U.S. cattle feed caused from the use of Canadian cattle products, like blood, in the manufacturing of cattle feed."