Mad Cow Disease Risk in United States

WASHINGTON (Reuter) March 17, 1997 - The U.S. Agriculture Department has released a study that found spinal cord and marrow in meat processed by high-tech equipment that strips meat from bone and said it would move quickly to squash a potential problem in food safety.

``The findings are very significant,'' said Thomas Billy, administrator of the department's Food and Safety Inspection Service. ``We need to shift to a different approach...''

The government study was prompted by concerns raised by consumer groups and industry about the meat product churned out by high-tech deboning equipment, called advanced meat recovery systems.

``The FSIS studies released today confirm our suspicions about AMR systems,'' Linda Golodner, president of the National Consumers League, said Fridayg. ``Americans do not expect or want bone, marrow, or nerve tissue in the meat they buy for their families.''

Consumer groups had been pressing the department to bar beef companies from processing spinal cord because of risk that so-called ``mad cow'' disease could get into the nation's food supply.

They argue that aside from the brain, the spinal cord is the most infectious part of an animal with BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy), the so-called ``mad cow'' disease that broke out in Britain and prompted a European boycott last year of British beef products. Studies have linked BSE to Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), a fatal ailment that attacks the human brain.

``As far as we know there is no BSE in the U.S., but since there are no guarantees we think it would be prudent to keep spinal cord out of the food supply,'' said Bob Hahn, Public Voice Director of Legal Affairs.

Department officials minimized health concerns.

``What we're talking about here is something that may not be meat,'' said Dr. Kaye Wachsmuth, acting deputy administrator for public health and science at the Agriculture Department.

Billy said the department would issue a directive in the next few weeks to clarify that spinal cord was not meat and would set new tasks for federal meat inspectors to ensure the thick cord of nerve tissue from the spinal column has been removed before carcasses are fed into the machines. The meat safety chief also said the department would review existing regulations.

``We think there are some pretty clear steps that can be taken that will improve the performance of this equipment,'' Billy said.

The Agriculture Department study also found the mechanically-recovered product had, on average, lower protein values, and higher fat, calcium, bone residue and cholesterol than meat that had been deboned by hand.

In addition, it found in some cases bones did not emerge from the meat machines intact, as mandated by law, but instead were crushed or pulverized.

Advanced meat recovery systems produce 300 to 400 million pounds of ground meat products each year, which are mixed in with retail ground beef, sausages and hot dogs, according to consumer groups. Until two years ago, the product was not called meat.