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Re: Mad Cow disease, BSE; Justice is served.



                    The mad cows of England*
              By Gail Braybon, East Sussex, England

     You will all have been interested in a TV program shown here
in the UK on Wednesday evening (in 9/95).  This was made by Mark
Purdey, an English organic dairy farmer, who started looking into
BSE (so-called "Mad Cow Disease").  He is quite convinced that the
cause of this is not contaminated feed (that contaminated sheep
with Scrapie, a similar brain disease) but use of OP (organophos-
phorus) pesticides, particularly against warble fly, which involves
pouring pints of pesticide over cows' skin.  One key piece of
supporting evidence is that nearly 10 years after contaminated feed
was withdrawn, there are still thousands of new cases of BSE every
year.
     Purdey is looking at damage to protein prions in cow's brains
>from  OP, and has become interested in the high rate of CFS (chronic
fatigue syndrome), Alzheimers and MS (multiple sclerosis) amongst
farmers, and people living near fields which are sprayed a lot.  He
also had support in his theories from a local M.D., a general
practitioner, who is seeing more and more sick farmers; and a
consultant at the University of Glasgow, who is convinced there is
a link between OP exposure and CFS (or ME as we tend to call it
here, also called CFS and Post Viral Fatigue Syndrome at various
times).  Several biochemists were also on to support his ideas.
     Depressing though this all is (and he did go on to talk about
high levels of OPs in intensive veggie production as well), I think
you would all have found it a relief to hear such views expressed
so clearly and reasonably.  I doubt if the program is available to
you in the U.S.:  It is made by a small production company, one of
many which provides interesting one off programs for Channel 4.
     It was also interesting to see how the government simply will
not release samples of BSE infected cows to anyone outside their
labs to do further analysis.  Once diagnosed, the cow is the
property of the government, and independent researchers don't get
a look in.~

*The above article appeared in the November, 1995, issue of Blazing
Tattles.  Claire W. Gilbert, Ph.D., Publisher, P.O. Box 1073, Half
Moon Bay, CA 94019, USA, Email: <blazing@crl.com>.






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