One Mad Cow Sets Off a Stampede
SCOTT C. RATZAN
Originally published in The New York Times
The discovery of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform
encephalopathy, in a cow in Washington State should concern us all.
Yet this is less because of any risk of contracting the disease through
eating beef and more because a knee-jerk reaction by the public, news
media and policy makers could threaten our ability to make a reasoned
and effective response to the threat.
So far, we are following the script from 1996, when Britain
issued a warning about a rise in a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease,
a brain-wasting syndrome in humans that resembles mad cow disease. The
experts envisioned all sorts of potential consequences. Some warned
of an outbreak that would kill millions, becoming the AIDS crisis that
Britain never had. The European Union and countries around the world
banned British beef.
Few people questioned the assertion that there was a link
between eating meat and Creutzfeldt-Jakob in humans. But the dire predictions
never came to pass: only about 20 Britons a year have died of the variant
of Creutzfeldt-Jakob since that scare. There were other victims though:
British beef farmers lost perhaps $10 billion in sales, and the British
public’s trust in government and the press took a severe blow.
Yet the old misperceptions are again at center stage.
Japan and South Korea have blocked American beef imports, cattle prices
are tumbling on North American exchanges, and Canada and the United
States are in a diplomatic tangle over who is to ‘‘blame’’
for the Washington cow.
Before we all go order that turkey burger, we should consider
a few facts. First, there is no direct evidence that Creutzfeldt-Jakob
comes from the ingestion of contaminated beef, or that the syndrome
deserves its reputation as the ‘‘human form’’ of
bovine spongiform encephalopathy.
In addition, the mad cow prion, the misfolded protein
that is thought to cause the disease in cows, has never been found in
solid muscle meat like the roasts, steaks and other cuts Americans are
likely to eat over the holidays. The parts that are known to get infected
– the brain, spinal cord and parts of the intestine – are
generally not used in American cooking (And there is a minority of scientists
who believe the prion is not the carrier of the disease.)
Equally important, most decisions on banning imports or
changing feedstocks in the British scare were made not by scientists
but by politicians and business people and were based on political and
economic considerations rather than actual risk to human health. History
is no guide here.
What is at stake here goes well beyond infected beef:
it involves questions of how we should respond to other outbreaks like
Sudden Acute Respiratory Syndrome and the flu epidemic. Competing messages
by the news media, politicians, watchdog groups and medical officials
continue to make the public uneasy.
Yes, the immediate focus must be to save lives. But as
a former public-health researcher (I am now a vice president in governmental
affairs in Europe for Johnson & Johnson, work that has no relation
to the mad cow issue), I feel we should also look at each new outbreak
as an opportunity to enhance public health. For example, the deadly
flu epidemic may in the end improve public hygiene if we can stress
the need for hand washing, explain to the public the infectious nature
of disease, and reinforce the value of epidemiologic measures.
Perhaps the mad cow discovery will lead to good policy
decisions based on sound science. But for now, that science does not
exist – we simply do not know exactly what we are dealing with.
Rushing ahead with bans and slapdash agricultural measures might divert
even more attention from the real threats to our health and well-being.
_____
Scott C. Ratzan MD, MPA is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Health
Communication: International Perspectives.
