Feds Still Have Not Enacted Laws to Stop Spread of Mad Cow Disease

From: The Oregonian

Mad cow safeguards not yet enacted

The FDA promised protections after the disease was found in Washington six months ago, and another cow is now being tested

July 02, 2004
MICHELLE COLE

In the winter weeks following the discovery of a lone infected cow in Washington state, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration calmed nervous consumers by announcing new safeguards against the spread of mad cow disease. Now, nearly six months later, none of the safeguards is in place, and the agency declined this week to say why or when they will be.

The measures -- among them a call to stop calves from being fed cow's blood
-- were announced Jan. 26 by Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson and then-FDA Commissioner Mark B. McClellan. They included:

Restricting brains, spinal cords and other tissues known to harbor the highest concentrations of brain-destroying agents from FDA-regulated foods, dietary supplements and cosmetics.

Prohibiting materials taken from dead or so-called "downer cattle" from FDA-regulated foods, dietary supplements and cosmetics.

Ending the use of poultry litter collected in hen houses -- typically comprising feces and contaminated feed -- in cattle feed.

Prohibiting the use of mammalian blood as a protein booster for young cattle.

At the time, the FDA said the rules would take effect upon publication in the Federal Register. But publication never happened.

FDA officials this week confirmed the rules had not taken effect. And a call Thursday to acting FDA Administrator Lester Crawford was referred to an agency spokeswoman who said she could not say when the new rules might be instituted.

That no new FDA protections are in place provokes concern among government officials and consumer advocates.

"I'm not happy about this at all. It's a public safety issue," U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, a Connecticut Democrat and co-chairwoman of the congressional Food Safety Caucus, said Thursday.

DeLauro accuses the FDA of "a lot of foot-dragging" even as the threat of mad cow disease remains. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is awaiting final results on an animal whose preliminary tests proved inconclusive for mad cow disease. Those findings are expected within days.

Carol Tucker Foreman, a former USDA assistant secretary and current director of the Food Policy Institute at the Consumer Federation of America, referred this week to the "mysterious, disappearing rules" and criticized the FDA for being lax.

"It's not unusual for a department to say we're going to put out some proposed rules and then have some time pass," Foreman said. "But for the (Health and Human Services) secretary and the FDA commissioner to call a press conference to announce it and then to disappear from the face of the Earth is pretty . . . unusual and irresponsible."

Jean Halloran, director of the Consumers Union Consumer Policy Institute, said she first thought the agency was simply "trying to get the language right."

"But it's gotten so far away that I think it's either gross incompetence or industry influence at work," she said.

Feed, meat and rendering industry representatives also await publication of the rules. They say they're not to blame for the delay, though some industry groups disputed the proposed rules early on and shared their opinions with the FDA.

"I imagine FDA is taking its time with the rule because so much is involved
-- they really want to do the right thing, not overreact and make unjustified decisions which cannot be reversed," said Rex Runyon, vice president of the American Feed Industry Association.

Tom Cook, president of the National Renderers Association, said cattle feed rules in place since 1997 are more than adequate to protect the public's safety. But he said he expects the FDA will publish the long-awaited new rules, perhaps within the next month.

"Any added regulation will probably bring some heartburn," Cook said.

DeLauro said she intends to raise the issue of the delayed FDA rules with her colleagues in Congress. But with national elections and the end of the session near, DeLauro said: "I don't have any illusions."

Michelle Cole: 503-294-5143; michellecole@news.oregonian.com