  Only reliable anti-BSE measures can ease people's anxieties about beef -- Akahata 'Current' columnThe government Food Safety Commission is asking for opinions on its advisory report that cows 20 months or younger can be exempted from BSE testing. The U.S. government's opinion note submitted on April 12 is posted on the U.S. Embassy in Japan website. It calls for the minimum age limit for BSE testing to be raised from 20 months to 30 months, arguing that BSE-suspected cows of 21 months and 23 months of age found in Japan are not confirmed as BSE-infected yet among international scientists. The United States is demanding that Japan's BSE-testing standards be further relaxed beyond the advisory opinion. However, on the same day, there was news that a former U.S. Department of Agriculture meat inspector testified in the Canadian parliament that there must be BSE-infected cows in the United States in addition to the already announced ones. The former inspector also stated in a Canadian newspaper that the U.S. government may have covered up cases of mad cow disease. A medical practitioners' magazine in its March issue ran a report of a journalist who visited the United States last year. It says that although a veterinarian discovered some shaky cows at a slaughterhouse, they were disposed without BSE testing. The report raises a question, "Is such a sloppy testing procedure adequate in the United States with 100 million cows?" The U.S. government not only published its opinion but also put pressures on Japan to resume U.S. beef imports by July as the U.S. secretary of state demanded. An opinion poll, however, shows that only fewer than six percent of Japanese people believe that BSE testing in the United States is better than that in Japan. About 70 percent think that the U.S. test is far behind the Japanese one. The only way to relieve people of their anxieties about beef is to increase the credibility of anti-BSE measures. (Akahata April 19, 2005) |