FEATURE/What to do about the ``Mad Cow''.

Feature Editors/City Desks/Health/Medical Writers

FEATURE...

--(BUSINESS WIRE)

The following is an opinion editorial provided by William Marler, managing partner at Marler Clark.

We as Americans have grown up being told that our food supply is the safest in the world. However, the CDC estimates that each year over 76 million of us become ill, 300,000 are hospitalized and over 5,000 die, just from eating food contaminated with a food borne pathogen.

In recent years, E. coli outbreaks have been linked to not just ground beef, but also to sprouts, lettuce, apple juice and steaks. Salmonella outbreaks have been traced to foods such as tomatoes, orange juice and cantaloupe. In the last months the largest Hepatitis-A outbreak in United States history has been linked to green onions. Last year, school children in a Chicago suburb were fed chicken fingers contaminated with ammonia. And now, Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) or "Mad Cow" disease has been discovered at a slaughterhouse in Washington State.

While the incubation period for most food borne pathogens is a matter of days, and human symptoms of Hepatitis-A infection frequently do not show up for over a month, symptoms of "Mad Cow," or the human variant known as Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, may not appear for decades. Because we should not have to worry about the meat we eat today, and the impact that it could have on us days or decades from now, we need stronger and more aggressive regulation and enforcement by the Government, specifically the USDA. This arm of the government must do everything it can to protect the consuming public from tainted product and to protect the US meat industry from economic suicide.

Our tables, and the entire food industry, can be protected by five available and simple decisions that will help promote food safety -- one, track animals from the farm to your fork; two, test for food borne pathogens; three, reconsider the use of "downer cattle;" four, give the USDA absolute authority to recall meat that may pose a risk to the public health; and, five, stop feeding animals (especially those at risk of harboring disease) to other animals.

We must require the meat industry to document where cows come from and where specific lots of meat are sold. That way, meat can be recalled quickly if a pathogen is detected anywhere in the process. Timely online records would allow meat to be efficiently tracked and recalled as soon as inspectors get a positive test result. We have the technology; we simply need to use it. The fact that the beef industry and the government did not know where the BSE contaminated cow came from or where its meat went is beyond belief. If we can track online a book from Amazon.com, we should be able to do the same with a cow.

While European countries have resorted to testing massive numbers of cows to both establish the prevalence of BSE and to eradicate the disease, the USDA has limited testing to less than 20,000 animals out of a US herd of millions. We also have the ability to cheaply and scientifically test meat for a whole host of contaminants before it hits our plate. Europe requires testing for "Mad Cow" for nearly every cow slaughtered. Many of the largest US retail purchasers of meat products now require pathogen testing (such as E. coli) before the meat reaches restaurants or grocery stores. We have the ability to test food before we eat it. Testing for all pathogens should happen at every stage of production -- from "farm to fork."

We know that the Washington State cow that has caused the entire US cattle market to collapse was what the industry calls a "downer" - a cow so sick that it can not walk to its own slaughter. It is estimated that over 200,000 such "downers" are used each year. If a cow is so ill that it needs to be dragged into the slaughter house, should it really be used in meat that might make it onto your child's plate? Congress considered banning the use of "downers" last year; perhaps reconsideration is in order.

Also, the USDA must be granted authority to recall any meat product it deems to be unfit for human consumption. Presently, the USDA can only "request" that the industry recall meat -- meat that has most likely already been consumed or is in someone's freezer. In today's risk filled World, we need an agency with the goal and the power to protect the public.

Finally, in 1997 the FDA banned the use in cattle feed of cow brain and spinal tissue. However, in 2002 according to the General Accounting Office report, several firms were violating the restriction and concluded that the ban was not adequate to control the spread of BSE. One would think tough enforcement is in order on the feeding of animal parts to other animals that are eventually consumed by humans. This should be a "no brainer."

We have the ability to live up to the billing of the safest food supply in the world. The question is whether this "Mad Cow" crisis will be the catalyst that finally starts the reform necessary to stop making US consumers ill and to regain the confidence of the World in our food supply.

William Marler is a Seattle trial lawyer specializing in food borne illness litigation and the father of three girls.

BACKGROUND: William Marler is the managing partner at Marler Clark (www.marlerclark.com). Marler Clark is the premiere food illness litigation firm in the United States. It has achieved great success representing victims, mostly children, in the largest outbreaks across the country over the last ten years. William Marler represented Brianne Kiner in her $15.6 million E. coli settlement with Jack in the Box in 1993. In 1998, Marler Clark resolved several cases for children who suffered kidney failure in the Odwalla apple juice E. coli outbreak. The firm represented most of the seriously injured victims in the Finely School E. coli outbreak of 1998, the Sun Orchard Salmonella outbreak of 1999, the E. coli Sizzler outbreak on 2000, the Wendy's E. coli outbreak of 2001, and the Con Agra E. coli outbreak of 2002. Marler Clark is presently involved in Chi Chi's Hepatitis A and Chili's Salmonella outbreaks. Marler Clark has also obtained record verdicts and settlements on behalf of thousands of people infected with E. coli, Salmonella, Hepatitis A, Listeria, Shigella and Campylobacter. Total recoveries to date on behalf of victims are in excess of $100 Million.

The partners at Marler Clark also speak frequently on issues of safe food and have formed www.outbreakinc.com, a non-profit business dedicated to teaching companies how to avoid food borne diseases. Marler Clark is also proud to sponsor the informational web sites of www.foodborneillness.com, www.about-ecoli.com, www.about-salmonella.com, www.about-shigella.com, www.about-norwalk.com, www.about-campylobacter.com, www.about-listeria.com, www.about-hepatitis.com, www.about-hus.com, www.about-ttp.com and www.fsis-pfge.org.