Well, here’s the UK stats for all types. But I think you mean vCJD, not CJD - one is caused by eating BSE-infected cattle, the other comes from just being unlucky in the lottery of life.
At a 161 cases over 12 years in a nation of 60 million odd people, it’s not exactly a plague of biblical proportions. Much to the relief of people like me who responed to the BSE hysteria by going on a steak-buying binge. It’s a nasty nasty thing to die from, but currently it pales into insignificance next to the risks of crossing the road.
This entire thread is totally off-topic. I’m not joking.
Sadly, the issue is a lot more complex, and was not improved by the fact that reporting was appallingly bad. The real issue seems to be false negatives, and that the Dept. of Agriculture does not want people using bad tests, then declaring their meet clean.
Well, not to toot my own horn or anything (okay, to do exactly that), I did say this in my second post:
Cheers for that link, though; very interesting. It also bears out my earlier point about the absolutely shocking level of science reporting in the general media. How can the fricking AP make such a mindbogglingly stupid error as to confuse false positives with false negatives? That’s so basic it hurts.
Also some interesting information on the regulatory niceties of the USDA’s action on that page. Apparently the Virus-Serum-Toxin Act of 1913 empowers them (requires them, even) to restrict any “worthless, contaminated, dangerous, or harmful virus, serum, toxin, or analogous product intended for use in the treatment of domestic animals.” The inclusion of “worthless”, combined with the concerns over false negatives, would seem to give more than a little validity to the USDA’s actions…
If the DoA operates anything like the DoJ that lackey intern (presumably a dropout from Bob Jones) never consulted anyone, except perhaps his Magik 8 Ball™.
Look, we’re not talking about “causing a panic” where people barricade themselves in their homes or head for the hills or start looting the stores. We’re talking about, “Honey, don’t get any beef at the supermarket until the news says for sure it’s OK.”
I realise this is almost pathetically optimistic on my part, but would you at any point care to address the very reasonable arguments that have been put forward to explain why a mass screening programme won’t provide any such assurance? Would you like to perhaps acknowledge smiling bandit’s post, and maybe discuss what implications it has for your cheerful condemnation of the USDA?
What does the level of panic matter, if it’s being caused for entirely spurious and stupid reasons? Are you so insistent on bashing the administration that you won’t even entertain the possibility that they might have a smidgen of a point?
Bolding mine. Here are estimates of the rate of false positives with the initial testing kits:
So, if they simply follow the same procedures, there will be no mass panic based on the use of current practices, since false positives are already followed up with more precise testing before announcements of BSE cases are made.
The concern about false negatives is even more stupid than that. The only problem with a false negative in terms of the request of the company in this case is that no new information is added to the process. The carcass will be processed in the same way if 1) no test is done, or 2) a test is done that incorrectly indicates a negative result.
You didn’t read a single damn thing in this thread, did you? I would go over the difference between diagnosis and screening (again), but you’ve clearly got your head too far up your own arse to pay attention. However, since you’re now apparently taking the USDA’s word (when it suits you), I will re-quote the 2005 USDA ruling from smiling bandit’s link (bolding mine):
In case the distinction still eludes you, the key words in the quote you thought was so damning are “with detectable disease”. The laboratory tests do indeed have incredible sensitivity and specificity when applied to carcasses in which the disease is sufficiently manifest. If you go away and think really hard, maybe - just maybe - you’ll realise what implications this has for your argument.
The rest of your cite, which you clearly didn’t read, explicitly details how the surveillance programme is targeted at subjects with high risk factors or pre-existing indicators of potential infection, precisely the sort of targeted diagnostic procedure that a sensible approach to large herd testing requires. I spent two long posts explaining why, when applied to a largely healthy population of 34 million cattle, even near-perfect is not good enough. You completely ignored this, cherry-picked a quote you thought sounded good for your case, and blithely charged ahead. Well done, you.
…and yet the carcass is certified (falsely) as being BSE-free. This is thus misinformation, and dangerous misinformation at that. Are you really happy to have beef marketed as completely safe, when the screening process provides no such guarantee? If so, your contempt for the safety of the consumer, and for the veracity of scientific information, is truly worthy of the great chimp himself.
I’ve read it all. You’ve made an attempt to defend this using bullshit and an opinion at someone’s blog. There would be no problem from false positives of screening because the diagnosis is made by more precise procedures before results are reported.
The issue of cattle being too young for the disease to be detectable gets to the issue of false negatives, but it is still irrelevant, unless the USDA is legally mandated to prevent the company from wasting it’s money.
Being an asshole about this all only undermines your argument. Not that you have much of one in the first place. Clearly, the court didn’t buy this lame fucking argument, and neither should anyone here. Are you so emotional about it because you have stock in a large beef company or something?
How is the information “dangerous”? Are people going to be eating something that they wouldn’t be eating otherwise? As it stands now, everything that is processed has made it through the present detection system, and is essentially a false negative.
As to the certification , simply have the certification be made not that the beef is BSE-free, but that no BSE was detected during a screening process. Anyone eating meat now because they think that their meat is BSE is committing the same error. Anyone eating meat now because they are gambling that the rate of BSE is so low that the risk of eating meat is an acceptable one is gambling at slightly better rates. Anyone not eating meat now because of the risk of BSE will be informed of the meaning of the screening protocol relative to the current screening system.
No, he hasn’t. He’s blithely insisted that mass screening is fine, and that false negatives hold no danger, in utter contradiction of both logic and evidence. At no point has he actually bothered to address the statistical niceties (or nasties) of a screening programme, preferring instead to write off basic probabilistic logic as “bullshit”. But hey, if that’s how you like your debate, tuck in.
Really? So you’re happy with mild panic being caused in a US industry for no practical purpose whatsoever? You’re happy with people being lulled into a false sense of security by an expensive programme that wouldn’t achieve any such guarantee? Well I never.
Wilful ignorance comes no more egregious than this, it really doesn’t. And it’s all the more frustrating with you, because unlike Hentor, I know you’re not stupid.
While I don’t want to get into the name-calling, the basic point here is:
The government in this case has a legal right and obligation to prevent the use of “worthless” tests. These tests are so inaccurate under most circumstances that their very use in every case we’re talking about (young cows) is a flagrant deception. These tests cannot detect this disease under these circumstances. These animals are years away of displaying the disease (which is what makes it so frightening). Some companies want to hit the export market, and using these tests for that is highly deceptive.
The complete and utter idiocy of the reporting is a seperate issue.
Aside from which, Brainglutton, let’s not be naive here. Had the Bush administration let this pass, you would have been screaming your head off about how “Bush doesn’t care about foreigners.”
Apart from the demonstration by several people here that this is a bogus position, the court already shot this bullshit down. Why should we accept from you the assertion that it is so obviously foolish?
Apparently the Japanese are able to detect the disease in younger animals because they use a technique called Western Blotting. Our USDA is in conflict with this test as well, despite it being reportedly cheaper and quicker than the Gold Standard method we use here.
Yes indeed; you’ve used deliberate scientific illiteracy and complete partisan sophistry to awe me into silence. What an incredible debating technique. You must be awfully proud.