Welcome to Terra Firm 10.

The first time the mundi club wrote about bovine spongiform encephalopathy (bse) was in ‘civic venom’ no.5 published april 6th 1990. Although mentioned only fleetingly it was accompanied by a rather gruesome photo with some viciously truthful captions. We would like to believe that this played some part in humberside county council’s decision to ban beef from school dinners - the first county in the country to do so. It was quite a remarkable act of defiance at the time but one which is now almost commonplace. One wonders just how many children were saved by this act.

The second time the mundi club covered the issue was after the first bse scare in the summer of 1990. This scare had blown up after bse’s first leap across the species’ barrier but had died away when the government’s chief medical officer, donald acheson, reassured the public that, "British beef can be safely eaten by everyone both adults and children." One wonders just how many people are now infected with bse because of this junk scientist.

This work has been written after the second major bse scare. This erupted because of the government’s announcement that 10 people had died from a new strain of creutzfeldt-jacob disease (cjd) believed to have derived from bse (this new human disease is referred to in this work as bse-cjd). The government had no conception that this announcement was responsible for traumatizing the brutish public. Having spent the last 10 years systemmatically covering up the issue and insisting that there was nothing to worry about it is hardly unsurprising that people were shocked at discovering the truth. Whatever the eventual number of bse fatalities amongst bipeds and quadrupeds, this is one of the most disgraceful episodes in recent brutish history. It exemplifies all too clearly the rancid, degenerate, sordid, and shameless, nature of thatcherism and neo-thatcherism.

In this work the primary issue is not thatcherism, the beef industry, nor even public health, but the slaughter of Animals, the Animal exploitation industry and the Earth’s life support system. Bse is a symptom of oomans’ exploitation of Animals. The spread of bse is a disaster for Animals but it presents an important opportunity to dismantle the Animal exploitation industry and thus save the Earth. The Animal exploitation industry is the world’s most ecologically disasterous industry. It has got to be abolished if oomans are to stand any chance of restoring the Earth’s life support system and combatting global warming. It is hoped this work will play some role in inspiring people to oppose the slaughter of Animals in the hope of crippling the Animal exploitation industry.

Introduction; Leading the Livestock to Slaughter.

For ten years various tory governments have stridently and arrogantly asserted that humans could not contract bse from infected Cattle. They were not merely insistent about it they ridiculed, denounced and humiliated anyone, even reputable scientists, who opposed their views. They claimed their view was scientific even though it is the antithesis of science. They persisted with this junk-science every time evidence emerged to the contrary. At a rough estimate, a dozen hypotheses put forward by tory governments to explain the nature of this disease have turned out to be false but this did nothing to undermine tories’ confidence in their position. On the contrary the more mistakes they made, the greater their assertion of junk science.

When the government announced the bse-cjd fatalities it might have been suspected that this would be the time when the government would admit that it had made a very substantial mistake over this disease; when it would discuss the possible consequences of the disease; when it would pay respect to the victims and commiserate with their families; when it would discuss compensation for the victims; and perhaps when it would admit to the drawbacks in this country’s appalling pharming practices. Not at all. Not in the slightest.

The dunblane massacre had been greeted with a great show of sorrow by members of parliament who couldn’t wait to express their horror at the tragedy and to offer their sincerest condolences to the victims, the victims’ relatives, and the local community. For the victims of bse-cjd there was no sadness, no remorse, no public mourning, no national one minute silence, not even a mention of their name. There was no commiseration with their families. The government and its mps wanted these people to be forgotten about as quickly as possible. They were a political embarrassment.

The government made its priority clear from the onset - it was not public health, nor the Animal exploitation industry but saving the beef industry. In one sweep of the broom the government swept away what could be an epidemic. The government had denied for 10 years that humans could be infected by this disease and now that a huge number of people had eaten diseased meat it didn’t want to talk about an epidemic. It was a dead issue. It was if the epidemic was officially over before it had even started.

To the government what was important was restoring confidence in beef not restoring people’s confidence in their own health. It was imperative to get back to normal so that everyone could continue to eat beef, restore the beef industry to its former glory, and pharmers could get on with pharming in the same way they had done for decades. What was important to the large herd of pharmers in the house of commons was discussing compensation for pharmers who couldn’t sell their Cattle because of the public’s irrational refusal to eat bse-infected meat. Mps had no interest in offering compensation to the families of the victims of this disease in order to avoid the long legal battles that will ensue for compensation for a disease which, after all, was caused primarily by these self-same mps. The government’s sole concern was re-establishing the beef industry as if nothing had happened and nothing would happen.

The government wasn’t in the slightest bit chastened, or sickened, by the 10 bse-cjd deaths. On the contrary, it went onto a blistering, self-righteous, propaganda offensive refusing to accept any responsibility for the spread of the disease; refusing to adopt any new policy to halt the spread of the bse; and screaming abuse at anyone pointing out the government’s mistakes in spreading the disease. There is not the slightest doubt that, if left to its own devices, the government would have persisted with its ‘there is nothing more to do’ policy and thus continued to spread the disease around the world as it had been doing for the last ten years. It would have led more and more consumers to their graves in order to protect the beef industry. What presents itself through this policy is the hideous spectacle of a land almost denuded of people but ruled over by fat-faced, fat-arsed, tory pharmers running a huge and highly profitable beef industry exporting its diseased disease-free, muck-ridden, products all over the world.

During stalin’s rule people were so oppressed by ideology and terror it was possible to round them up and walk them off to the labour camps without any fear of resistance. It took one guard to collect dozens of people. This is what the government tried to do when it announced the bse-cjd deaths. It had no terror at its disposal but its propaganda was so ferocious it silenced many critics. Anyone raising objections were accused of scaremongering, destroying public confidence in the Cattle industry, destroying jobs, underming the country’s economy, and even being unpatriotic.

The media rapidly picked up the government’s line that the focus of concern was not the bse-cjd victims, nor public health nor Animal exploitation but saving the beef industry. Bbc1’s news at nine had the caption ‘Beef crisis’ over its background photograph - it didn’t even mention the latest bse-cjd victim. Channel four’s evening news covered the bse crisis for 10 minutes focussing exclusively on the problems facing the beef industry and devoted one sentence to the news of the latest death from bse-cjd; tony blair, interviewed on channel four’s evening news didn’t mention the victims of bse let alone commiserate with their families - all he was concerned about was saving tory mps, "What is absolutely essential is that we recognize that we are facing a serious crisis in our farming industry and British beef."

The government tethered itself into its stalls and prepared itself to do nothing in the face of a possible epidemic. It was only the european community which prevented the brutish government from sacrificing the population for the sake of protecting tory mps’ pharms. None of the government’s measures taken since the announcement of the bse-cjd fatalities would have been introduced if it hadn’t been for europe’s ban on the export of beef and beef products.

The european community rushed onto the scene as an international saviour saving the brutish people from the barbarities of their own government. But its promise to protect public health turned into a nightmare when it insisted that brutland must execute, at the very least, four and half million Cattle to eradicate the disease. This slaughter is on a par with the lower estimates of the total number of bipeds exterminated by the nazis during the second world war. Given the small number of waste incinerators in brutland it’s a wonder the european community didn’t suggest opening up the nazis’ incineration camps (currently serving as holocaust memorials - memorials intended to remind us lest we forget!) to increase the rate at which brutish Cattle are slaughtered. There could hardly be any greater vindication of ronnie lee’s claim that the Animal exploitation industry is no different from the nazis’ extermination programme. The incinerators are exactly the same and the mentality of mass slaughter carried out as a normal, everyday practice is also the same.

It would be wrong to brand european leaders as eco-nazis whilst praising the brutish government for opposing the slaughter of Animals. The proposed slaughter of Cattle is not merely morally abominable it is unnecessary since there is supposed to be a scientific test which can determine which Cows are infected by bse. But the tory government is impaled on one of its many lies and cannot use the test to prevent a massacre to which it is totally opposed (solely for economic not moral reasons) because to do so would mean having to admit that it has been lying. The government has insisted that bse resides solely in Cattle offal but one of the leading scientists is reputed to have developed a test to detect the disease in Cattle’s urine which means the bse prion spreads throughout a Cattle’s body. The tories proclaim the Cattle massacre has no scientific basis and is solely a symbolic gesture to appease public confidence. It is not. It is another testiment to tory lies. The brutish government are even worse eco-nazis than european leaders because they could stop the massacre.

Bse Fatalities.

Nearly 200,000 Animals around the world have now died either from this new disease or because of this disease. Millions more face execution.

Bse-Cjd Fatalities.

The government has not published a list of the people who have died from bse-cjd. Over the years there have been various claims that individuals have died from the disease but there is no scientific evidence to prove these claims. Such individuals could well have died from cjd but not bse-cjd. This section lists the people believed to have died from bse-cjd.

Peter warhurst - the first identified case of a dairy farmer dying of cjd. He died March 11th 1993. One of the Cattle on his pharm had bse.

Mark duncan templeman - died july 1993, "another farmer who lost cattle to BSE."

Peter hall - 20, from county durham who died in feb 1996.

Jean wake - 38, from washington, tyne and wear died november 1995, worked as a meat chopper.

Stephen churchill - 19, of devizes, wiltshire, may 1995. He was the first known victim of bse-cjd.

X - an unnamed 17 year old died in 1995.

Ken sharpe - 42, of childwall, liverpool.

Michelle bowen - 29, from harpurhey, manchester, died november 1995.

Maurice callaghan - 30, of belfast, died in 1995

Tommy pinkerton - the latest bse-cjd fatality, a retired glass factory worker,71, of wallsend, tyne and wear - died 16.3.96.

i) Scientists Warnings about BSE.

Vernon Coleman.

.. "all the evidence shows that mad cow disease could well be the plague that AIDS was never going to be."

"Most cattle are slaughtered after just two and a half years, but the incubation period - before the symptoms appear - is around four years. Although 300 cases are detected with the obvious symptoms every week, there are literally millions of Animals carrying the infection, with little possibility of showing the disease if they’ve got it."

"If you want to be absolutely safe you should not eat beef or eat foods containing beef products."

"The committee was frightened by the news (of the 10 bse-cjd deaths). The implications of it are rather worrying."

"By now the CJD Surveillance Unit had heard of 10 of these highly unusual cases, "This has occurred despite our predictions so its a great surprise and a matter of great concern. The similarities between these case suggests that there is a single type of agent causing this disease and it seems most likely given what’s happened in this country that this might be the BSE agent."

Neuro-pathologist professor bernard tomlinson announced he wouldn’t eat meat pies, beef livers or burgers.

When jerry wiggin, a tory mp with pharming interests, asked "Is it likely that the housewife would get as far as ingesting any of this material (bse-infected meat from abattoirs)? john pattison said, "We were convinced that it was possible."

In regard to those denying that there could be a link between bse and cjd, "Anyone who says there is definitely no link is talking hogwash"