February 10, 2006

US tests 605,000 cattle for mad cow disease

The USDA has released a review of the Department's BSE enhanced-surveillance programme, which has tested more than 605,000 cattle to date. The programme had been expanded in June 2004, six months after the US's first confirmed case of mad cow disease. Until then, the US had been criticized for only testing a small fraction of the cattle for slaughter.

Since then, USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) and its Food Safety and Inspection Service have made a number of improvements to the programme. APHIS is currently analysing data from the enhanced-surveillance programme to anticipate future trends of the disease.

The programme was the largest BSE surveillance effort the US has ever undertaken, said APHIS chief veterinarian Ron DeHaven. In a few months, the industry, working with state and federal agencies, collected more than eight times the number of samples tested for BSE in 2003, he said.

The goal of the enhanced-surveillance programme is to test as many cattle from the  high-risk population as possible, said DeHaven. The programme, which costs US$1 million a week, tested nearly 1,000 high-risk cattle a day. Only one out of more than the 605,000 animals tested had mad cow disease.