January 1st 1998: Ooman Thugs Banned from Forcing Animals to become Cannibals.

Jack cunningham is proving to be a much better secretary of state for agriculture than originally predicted. Albeit belatedly, he takes yet another decision which ruffles pharmers' feathers, "Pigs and chickens in britain will no longer have to live like cannibals. Agriculture minister jack cunningham has decided to act on the advice of experts on bse and other prion diseases. He is to ban "same species feeding" in order to avoid a repeat of mad cow disease in other livestock. Pigs and Chickens might also be susceptible to prion disease, cunningham's advisers have warned, and so could in theory catch the brain wasting conditions from contaminated offal." [1] This is an amazing revelation given that the tories seemed to have outlawed this practice after the announcement of the cjd-bse outbreak. When the tories declared they were going to stop Animals being used in Animal feed they were yet again being devious with the truth.

January 5th 1998: Tory Pharmers Snorting in the House of Lords.

The massed ranks of geriatric pharmers in the house of lords reject the government's ban on beef on the bone. What a surprise. The vote against the bill is inconsequential.

January 10th 1998: Liberals Beefing about Bones.

"The government last night fought off a concerted opposition demand to retreat from the controversial ban on beef-on-the-bone, imposed by jack cunningham ..." [2]

January 13th 1998: Bma Insists all Meat should be Treated as Contaminated.

The number of people suffering from food poisoning is rocketing to such an extent the medical profession warns consumers to regard all uncooked meat as contaminated. (Although it fails to mention that it might be contaminated with bse). The news is covered in virtually all sections of the media and provokes a major public scare over health, "In a submission to a Commons Agriculture Committee inquiry into food safety, the BMA says: "The state of food safety in the UK is such that all raw meat should be assumed to be contaminated with pathogenic organisms."" [3]

January 1998: Cunningham wants to reduce Dairy Subsidies.

The election of the labour government is triggering off more and more anger amongst farmers and the farming related portions rural communities. They were infuriated by the ban on handguns and the possible outlawing of Fox hunting, etc. But there was one issue which, more than any other, generated a substantial amount of fear amongst pharmers about their long term future - the government's aim of abolishing agricultural subsidies in the next round of the gatt treaty. Tony blair was an ardent supporter of global free trade - following in the footsteps of his beloved margaret thatcher. He'd appointed cunningham as secretary of state for agriculture specifically to pursue this goal and this month cunningham tells an audience of pharmers' representatives that continued subsidies to pharmers are no longer feasible. He wants the abolition of subsidies on cereals, beef and dairy products, and an end to the system of milk quotas. [4] The seriousness with which this statement was taken could be seen from the fact that it led to a bbc tv 'panorama' investigation into countryside issues, "Mr cunningham's attitude has shocked the farmers. In the past they have been able to count on considerable political support. Since the second world war, the government has used taxpayers' money to guarantee the production of food. The cap now costs us £3billion a year. The government wants reform and less subsidy. They want a new basis for agriculture." [5]

January 18th 1998: Test for Bse-Cjd in Oomans - but not for Cattle.

John collinge believes he has discovered a means of testing for bse-cjd. He .. "produced a simple biochemical test to distinguish normal from new variant cjd. In his initial experiments, collinge had to extract the prp from the brains of patients .. But in last week's issue of the 'lancet', the researchers reported that prp isolated from the tonsils of one of the new variant cjd victim they have tested so far shows the same characteristic banding." [6] Strange, though, there is no test yet for Cattle.

January 27th 1998: Beefies Back on Campaign Trail.

"A £2 million campaign aimed at encouraging beefeaters to buy british was launched yesterday. The drive follows evidence that nearly 75% of consumers prefer to eat home-grown beef. Organized by the meat and livestock commission the goal is to convert people to british beef and put pressure on importers to shop at home." [7]

January 27th 1998: Opening of Public Inquiry into Bse.

The government's public inquiry into bse opens today.

January 28th 1998: Pharmers in the Lords Still Demand Lifting of Bse Bans.

"The Government was defeated in the House of Lords last night when peers called for an end to the ban on beef on the bone. Tory and Liberal Democrat peers united to back a resolution calling for regulations introduced last December banning the sale of all beef bone products to be revoked. The Lords voted by 207 to 97, an opposition majority of 110. Although the resolution does not force the Government to take action, the vote steps up the pressure on ministers to repeal the ban, which is facing growing unpopularity around the country." [8] This rebellion might seem like an act of populism by the lords but, then again, they've opposed every measure against bse since the discovery of the disease 15 years ago.

January 28th 1998: Police getting Tough with Yob Pharmers.

The police are starting to get tougher with the rowdy crowds of rent-a-mob pharmers blockading ports around the country demanding more subsidies for diseased meat and the rising value of the pound. One policeman was seriously injured in holyhead trying to stop the thugs from hijacking another lorry load of irish beef. If this had been an Animal rights protest the police would have arrested large numbers of protestors and then gone on fishing expeditions through their homes looking for additional charges to bring against them.

January 31st 1998: Test for Bse-Cjd - Still no Test for Livestock.

"Consumers in ireland last week became the first shoppers to be given the option of buying beef tested for bse. But there is no evidence that the test can identify carcasses of infected Animals which have not yet developed symptoms. And while the supermarket chain involved is careful not to claim that the tested meat is "bse free", scientists fear that the public may assume that this is the case." [9]

January 1998: Stanley Pruisner wins Nobel Prize.

"The 1997 Nobel prize in physiology or medicine goes to stanley pruisner for his controversial 'pioneering discovery' that a new type of infectious agent can cause an important group of fatal diseases." [10]

February 1998: Butchers Flouting Diseased Corpses - 'How many more Times do we have to tell you we don't Care if this meat is Diseased'.

The government decides it needs to tighten the regulations concerning its bse-on-the-bone ban after health inspectors claim it is unworkable. Many butchers are openly flouting the ban, "By the end of last month, the government's health officials were reporting widespread flouting of the law by butchers who claimed the public wanted to make up its own mind about the risks." [11]

February 6th 1998: Department of Health Keeps Quiet about Bse-cjd in Blood Transfusions.

"Don't tell the recipients of the bse-cjd donors that they may be infected. This was the directive from the Department of Health and was based generally on the fact that there was no way to find out if the person had become infected and no way to treat them anyway. They decided it would be ethically better to allow the people to live in more blissful ignorance than depressed by the knowledge." [12] The department of health isn't concerned about people's health so much it is concerned the corpses might start waving their shrouds in protest at the department's total failure to prevent the spread of bse-cjd. They might even start taking retaliatory action against the pharmers who were responsible for spreading the disease.

February 2nd 1998: Pharmers Still Spreading the Shit.

"The dumping of untreated human sewage and abattoir waste on britain's farmland poses a serious threat to health, experts warn. .. the public health laboratory service (phls) warns that such practices put people at risk from escerichia coli 0157 infection. Phls scientists (say that) the deadly food poisoning bacterium and viruses such as hepatitis A are present in effluent used to fertilize fields housing livestock or growing vegetables. In the hope that most of the bacteria will die off, the sewage is allowed to stand for up to three months before being used as agricultural fertiliser. But pennington notes that no one knows how long the bacteria remain infective. The chartered institute of environmental health is now demanding a ban on the use of untreated abattoir waste on farms." [13]

February 4th 1998: Pattison's Predictions about Bse and Bse-Cjd.

In early 1996, john pattison was one of the main scientists demanding precautionary measures against bse so, even though he is a government adviser, his views cannot be simply dismissed like many of the other pharming loving, meat-eating member on seac, "The number of people who will die from the human form of "mad cow" disease is likely to be relatively small, and the disease in cattle is rapidly disappearing, a leading scientist said yesterday. Sir John Pattison, Dean of University College London Medical School, said there was increasing reason to believe that the 23 human deaths seen so far did not represent the start of an epidemic. Professor Pattison, who heads the scientific committee advising the Government on the disease, said the total number of deaths was unlikely to exceed 1,500 and could be as low as 100. Pattison said scientific predictions suggested that the annual number of new cases of bse would drop to 235 animals by the year 2000, and no more than 89 by the following year. "I hope and I believe that 1998 will be the turn-around year for bse"" [14]

February 6th 1998: Oprah Taken to Court for Speculating about Bse in the U.S.

Oprah winfrey is taken to court by beef farmers after remarks made on her television chat show. She invited a former farmer, now a vegetarian, who claimed that 100,000 cows in the u.s. were dying each year and that their remains were being crushed up and recycled into livestock feed. He pointed out that if just one of these Cows was contaminated by bse then it could spread rapidly around the country's beef herds. After she heard this oprah declared she was no longer going to eat burgers. The livestock pharmers are suing oprah under a little known state law passed in 12 states. The "food disparagement' laws or more accurately 'laws preventing people from complaining about the spread of livestock diseases' are known as veggie libel laws because virtually anyone explaining the reasons for switching to a vegetarian diet could find themselves being sued by livestock pharmers, "The cattle ranchers claim that ms winfrey's 1996 show about mad cow disease was so reckless and inflammatory that it caused beef prices to plummet to a ten year low. But this is not an ordinary libel case. At its core is the viability of a new law, on trial for the first time. The food disparagement law, also known as the veggie libel law, was designed to prevent public criticisms of perishable goods that could deter others from eating them. The ranchers real beef with ms winfrey lies in her choice of guest, howard lyman, a former rancher who, after studying the british debate about cjd-bse, turned vegetarian. He told ms winfrey's 20 million viewers: "If only one cow had mad cow disease, it has the potential to affect thousands." Ms winfrey replied: "It stopped me cold from eating another hamburger." Earlier in the week the pulitzer prize winning poet maya angelou arrived to give her support .. wrapped in a huge fur coat." [15] If these sort of laws had been passed in brutland then large numbers of people would never have heard of bse and would be wondering what all these mad oomans were doing walking the streets. What a disaster that would have caused - then again, come to think of it, perhaps these laws might have some virtues after all.

February 11th 1998: Liberal Democrats Want more Urbanites to eat Bse.

"The angry exchanges came during a late night commons debate called by the liberal democrats in the hope of overturning the Beef Bones Regulations. Charles Kennedy, the liberal democrat agriculture spokesman, condemned the ban as "unworkable and unenforceable". He said: "This is a bad law and the Government should take the opportunity to go home and think again."" [16] We now have a political situation where all three of the main political parties are more concerned with protecting the interests of pharmers rather than consumers.

February 15th 1998: Tory Pharming Welfare Scroungers on the Rampage Again.

Subsidy-addicted pharmers are out on the streets demonstrating yet again. If these lazy, welfare spongers spent more time on their pharms doing some work rather than going out on demonstrations all the time they might not be in the mess they're in. It's strange how pharmers are increasingly coming to resemble students, "Furious farmers pelted agriculture minister jack cunningham's car with eggs yesterday in protest about the beef crisis. About 70 took part in the demo outside a london studio." [17] Although the protest is ostensibly about the bse export ban what they are also protesting about is the cheap beef coming into the country as a result of the appreciation of the pound. Tory pharmers are simply not used to the idea of having to live by market forces even though they have forced most other sections of society to do so.

February 20th 1998: Bse-cjd is just not an important Disease.

Alan colchester, a leading neurologist, once again appeals to the government to take action against a waste disposal firm dumping bse-infected material into water courses. Colchester made the same point nearly two years ago, "The area should be fenced off. We have to err on the safe side." [18]

February 22nd 1998: There were only a few Vets who were willing to speak out against Bogus Science.

Richard sibley is one of the few vets who dismisses the idea that it is possible to determine whether any Animal is free from bse or not. Unfortunately, rather than using this argument to conclude that it is not possible to state that brutish beef is safe to eat, thereby dismissing the tory's policies of the last few years, he uses it to undermine the introduction of europe's Cattle certification scheme which is supposed to stop the spread of bse, "To certify a herd or Animal as being bse free is scientifically impossible. I'd be happy to certify an Animal as coming from a herd that has never had a recorded case or that an Animal was not showing clinical signs of bse but i would have great difficulty in certifying an Animal that was incubating the disease."" [19]

February 27th 1998: Government Bans a Range of Ooman Blood Products.

The pressure that scientists have managed to exert on the government to prevent the spread of bse-cjd through ooman blood finally pays off when the government announces a wide ranging ban on ooman blood products, "More than 30 treatments made from british blood and needed by up to 350,000 people each year are to be withdrawn because they might spread bse-cjd, health officials warned yesterday. Treatments such as growth factor for haemophiliacs or albumin supplies for burns victims are pooled from up to 66,000 donors at a time. If just one of them is suffering from bse-cjd, and if the disease could be spread by blood - itself an unknown - then in theory huge numbers could be at risk. Drug companies have been advised to stop using u.k. blood products in vaccines and other products. Last year health officials discovered that 3 of 23 people who contracted bse-cjd had been blood donors. Blood is a mix of a liquid known as plasma and red and white blood cells. .. the change could annually affect 100,000 surgical patients, up to 90,000 pregnant women, and tens of thousands who need hepatitis vaccines, tetanus immunization and special diagnostic treatment." [20]

February 27th 1998: John Snow's Meaty Integrity.

News of the ooman blood ban is carried by channel four news. For virtually the first time since the epidemic began, that well known carnivore john snow takes a tentative step towards reality and asks one of his interviewees whether, since bse-cjd is in ooman blood, there is any chance that bse might be found in Cattle blood. The line taken by the scientist is that even if bse is in Cattle blood it doesn't matter because oomans won't absorb the disease when they eat meat - there is a far higher risk of getting bse by injecting Cattle blood products directly into oomans' bloodstream. Since it is now becoming more and more untenable for the beef elite to deny that bse is in Cattle blood the next best thing they can do is to belittle its importance. Snow begins to wind up the interview and even asks whether bse in Cattle blood implies there is likely to be maternal transmission of bse. There is very little public anxiety about the ban on ooman blood since the public seems increasingly unconcerned about the spread of the disease.

February 1998: John Major Condemns Saddam for Spreading Biological Diseases around the World.

The gulf war looks as if it might flare up again this month when saddam hussein refuses to allow american and jewish arms inspectors to continue demilitarizing his country - whilst israel continues building up huge arsenals of chemical, biological, and nuclear, weapons. Several brutish newspapers attempt to crank up popular support for yet another war with iraq - particularly the jewish owned daily mirror - by claiming that saddam has enough biological weapons to kill everyone on the planet three times over - although since america has destroyed iraq's medium range weapons it is a little difficult to ascertain how he could spread this poison around the world. This story was later revealed to be a hoax.

John major makes a great speech in the house of commons giving his reasons why the allies should yet again pulverize a country on which they have dumped huge quantities of nuclear waste causing cancers in thousands of young children and pushed millions of iraqi children into a state of near starvation for the last six years. Not surprisingly, the jewish owned mirror is not interested in campaigning to end this appalling oppression.

No one in this country seems to appreciate the irony of john major making a speech condemning saddam for spreading lethal diseases around the world. It takes only half a teaspoonful of bse to kill a Cow and yet, for the seven years of his premiership, major insisted that brutland should be allowed to export millions of bse infected Cows, and hundreds of millions of tons of bse infected meat. Even saddam couldn't possibly have imagined spreading such a lethal disease to such vast numbers of people/Animals over such a vast area of the Earth - especially with legal impunity since the wto's free trade system prevents bans on sales of diseased meat. There are now dozens of countries around the world with outbreaks of bse and doubtlessly the disease will also afflict many oomans. What difference is there between saddam using biological weapons on his own people and john major encouraging the world to eat bse infected beef? As always with the leaders of the western world, hypocrisy, stupidity, and the perpetuation of injustice, is the order of the day. John is commonly regarded by sychophants in the media as a great humanitarian, won an award for his contributions to parliamentary debates after being booted out of office because of his government's widespread corruption!

March 1st 1998: Major Condemns Ban on Spreading Bse around the World.

Incredible. Right on cue. In an interview with david frost, john major claims the bse-on-the-bone ban is "beyond comprehension" and "folly". [21] The sheer gall of this man is unbelievable. Saddam has murdered 5,000 kurds with chemical weapons whilst john major has, up to may 2000, contributed to the murder of 53 people with bse-cjd ... and still counting. Thatcher, major, and the members of the maffia, nfu, and house of lords, ought to be put on trial for crimes against humanity.

March 1st 1998: Countryside March in London.

The media has been dominated all week by news of this sunday's march in london organized by the countryside alliance. The sheer scale of the publicity given to this event by the media is huge - clearly revealing, yet again, the power that pharmers have in getting their views picked up by the media. If ironies had abounded a few months earlier when both the miners and pharmers were asking for compensation, they weren't in short supply on this march either. Nobody knew quite what the march was about. Some thought it was an opportunity to give country folk the right to protest about various government policies - from the ruination of the green belt, the proposed ban on Fox hunting, the right of access to the countryside, the lack of rural services, etc, although as various commentators pointed out, if this was a march about the lack of rural services it would be the first time in history that the country's norman landowners had protested about the decline of living standards amongst the rural poor.

The march is a polyglot mixture of motives. One of the most significant protests, however, is pharmers objecting to the ban on beef exports, the bse-on-the-bone ban, and, of course, the lack of subsidies for:-

diseased Sheep,

diseased Cattle,

the rising pound, and,

rural services.

Many pharmers are also protesting about the government's miderable compensation for:-

the wages lost during the time spent on picket lines ransacking lorries,

the mental anguish suffered because of allegations that they have covered up the scale of bse fatalities;

the mental anguish they have suffered as a result of their attacks of conscience over causing so many bse-cjd fatalities.

The big fear behind this march, however, is that the next round in the gatt negotiations is going to abolish all agricultural subsidies. For 18 years the tory government promoted the free market, global free trade, and globalization, but never once sought to impose such rules on their rural supporters - the pharmers. When it came into power the labour government stated its commitment to the next round of gatt changes and wanted to sweep away agricultural subsidies. This would cause huge changes to the countryside which would dwarf all other factors.

The threat of global free trade in agricultural products sparked off fears in rural areas not only in brutland but in many other european countries. In this country, television news' broadcasts about the countryside march conveniently neglected to mention that the brutish march coincided with similar protests by pharmers in italy and brussels against proposed reductions in the colossal £30 billion subsidies being given to european pharmers each year. The brutish pharmers who supported the tories' anti-european ideology during the 1990s now find themselves demanding that europe should protect them from a labour government which is intending to carry through thatcherite free market reforms of their grossly inefficient industries.

Norman tebbit is interviewed because of his participation in the countryside alliance's march in london. He emphasizes the alliance's message to the government - 'listen to us'. Is it possible he might have forgotten he was one of the most strident members of one of the most ideologically bigoted and intransigent government's this country has ever known?

The countryside march turned out to be a watershed in the labour government's first term of office. It led to the dismissal of cunningham and, eventually, the relocation of john prescott both of whom were proposing policies which challenged rural privileges. From this point onwards the tiny numbers of rural people in this country managed to dominate the political spotlight whilst urban areas continued their decline into dereliction.

March 5th 1998: Blair Attacks tories for Creating Bse.

For some bizarre, uncharacteristic reason, tony blair, the beef loving premier, accuses the tories in the house of commons, "They gave the country bse!" [22]

March 5th 1998: Export Ban in Northern Ireland up for Review.

"The government last night welcomed the prospect that beef exports may resume later this month from .. northern ireland. The certified herds scheme will apply to meat from Cattle aged between six and thirty months, with computerized records, from herds proven to be free of bse for at least 8 years. At present, that means only Cattle from northern ireland will be eligible for export." [23] The lifting of the ban will probably be passed by european agriculture ministers who are meeting on march 16th.

March 9th 1998: Bse Inquiry Opens to Public.

The bse inquiry opens to the public. The chairperson asks the prime minister to allow the inquiry to be extended for another 6 months and tony blair agrees. He states he is going to conduct a thorough analysis of the decisions made during the bse epidemic. He points out that these decisions were, at the time, difficult to make even though they now appear easy with the benefit of hindsight. This is the code used to indicate the inquiry will be a didgery widgery.

March 11th 1998: Loony Pharmers challenge Bse-on-the-Bone Ban.

"The ban on sales of beef on the bone faces legal challenge after a hotelier yesterday won the first hurdle in his battle to have the new regulations ruled illegal by the courts. Lawyers acting for james sutherland, the first person in britain to be prosecuted under the ban imposed by the government last year .. Mr sutherland's case has become a cause celebre for scottish farmers, and 150 turned up to support him yesterday as he made his first appearance on the charge." [24] What a surprise that rural magistrates should come down in favour of a country cousin breaking the law.

March 14th 1998: Boom in Cattle Disease Subsidies.

"According to a government commissioned report, the first year of the bse crisis cost britain nearly £1 billion and 1,000 jobs. The impact was less severe because consumers and manufacturers switched from beef to british pork, lamb and poultry. Jobs were saved because the government pumped £1.5 billion of taxpayers' money into subsidies and compensation for farmers, abattoirs and renderers. Once government subsidies and the growth in other u.k. meat sales were taken into account, the farming industry actually saw a rise in revenue in 1996 compared to the previous year. So far 170,734 cattle have gone down with bse. Since the slaughter of Animals over 30 months old began in 1997, more than 2 million have been killed." [25]

March 18th 1998: Pharmers Dumping Bse Carcasses to Cover up Spread of Bse.

"Farmers were accused yesterday of killing and burying sick cattle on their farms to avoid having to report them as suspect cases of "mad cow" disease. Richard Lacey, the Professor of Microbiology at Leeds University, told the public inquiry into bse that he did not accept government figures showing a sharp decline in the number of infected cattle. Professor Lacey, a longstanding critic of official policy, said government scientists had underestimated the transmission of the disease from cow to calf and had relied too heavily on the hypothesis that contaminated feed was the main source of infection. He said he expected cases of human bse, or new-variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (nvCJD), to rise in the next century, and it was likely that the human infection could also be passed from mothers to offspring. "It seems likely that intraspecies transfer will occur through, for example, blood materials and surgery," he added. Professor Lacey said he had been told by knackermen and renderers that "because the value of carcasses is now negative, the animals are being buried on a massive scale in farm burials"." [26]

March 18th 1998: Roy Anderson Predicts Bse will Disappear Soon.

Anderson tells the bse inquiry that bse will soon disappear, "Roy Anderson of Oxford University's zoology department told the inquiry on Monday that the bse epidemic was likely to have dwindled to only a handful of new cases by 2001. He also said that transmission of the disease from cow to calf was not taking place often enough to prolong the epidemic." [27]

March 19th 1998: Pharmers still Covering up Bse.

Channel four news picks up on lacey's story recounted at the bse inquiry. It was reported that despite the financial incentives available to pharmers to claim compensation for bse infected Cattle, many were choosing to bury their dead in secret mass graves in order to save the reputation of their herds. These burials pose a threat to the water supply system. Dozens of secret pits exist in the hills of spay in scotland. A scottish vet wrote to the maffia complaining about the practice which is believed to be taking place on a massive scale but has not yet received a reply. The same thing is allegedly happening in wiltshire and east anglia but is doubtlessly also happening all over the country. The source of these suspicions is renderers who are no longer earning the same amounts of money they used to for removing dead livestock. [28]

March 20th 1998: Second Anniversary of the Bse Epidemic Passes Unnoticed.

The second anniversary of the bse-cjd crisis passes virtually unnoticed in the media. It as if the media has concluded that bse no longer exists. Television journalists have clearly been given the message they have to devote more time and energy to praising the great deeds of the country's plucky pharmers in their heroic struggle for further government subsidies. They are now much more concerned about saving the pharming industry's free market subsidies, extending prairie pharming to preserve Plants; and promoting hunting to save Animals.

March 20th 1998: Government decides to Release names of Bse-cjd Victims - 23 Dead so Far.

"Until now the government has revealed only the number of confirmed victims, and has shied away from releasing names. But with the wide ranging bse public enquiry now under way, the victims' identities have been published. Twenty three people have died in the past four years. Another four, including clare tomkins, are still alive but with no hope of recovery. But two years on the death toll stands at 23 with an average of two new cases appearing every three months." [29]

March 21st 1998: Cannibalism still Rife in Beef Industry: UK Animals still being fed with Animal Products.

Although in march 1996 it seemed the tory government had outlawed cannibalism in the livestock industry it appears this was not the case, "Some farmers in the u.s. are giving Calves a processed food supplement that contains Cows' blood. The practice has not caught on in britain. But even the strict british prohibition of feeding Animal protein to Cows makes an exception of blood and milk, so it would not be illegal. There is no evidence that bse is transmitted by eating blood. "We consider blood a safe product for Cattle, so long as Cattle have been killed for human consumption," says ray bradley." [30] The government cannot ban the use of Cattle blood in Animal feed without having to admit that bse is present in Cattle blood and that all beef contains the disease. This is of course helping to spread bse amongst Cattle and bse-cjd amongst oomans.

April 1998: The Silence of Fake Scientists.

Dealler highlights the fact that the medical profession has written only one article about bse - as if it does not regard bse as a public health issue, "One major article by Richard Johnson into the Real and Theoretical threats to human health posed by the epidemic of bse is particularly interesting in that only one other public health expert has actually ever written on the subject (Will Patterson) and that was followed by stony silence from his peers." [31]

April 1998: Bse in Ooman Blood: Labour/Maffia Thugs Silencing Scientists.

Dealler thinks the labour government/maffia have been leaning on a couple of scientists to force them to declare that bse-cjd is not present in ooman blood, "Barbara and Flannagan announce that UK blood is safe. This was towards the end of the editorial in the BMJ indicating that UK plasma may well not be safe. This looks remarkably like they had been pressed by higher figures and reminds a number of people in the field of the similar announcements by the maff concerning beef. B and F are, however a very realistic pair and know what is really going on." [32]

April 18th 1998: Rural Judiciary shows its support for Bse-Infected Beef.

"The case against jim sutherland, who served beef on the bone at a dinner for 180 people last december, was dismissed at falkirk sheriff court after it was ruled that the wording of the legislation imposing the ban last december was defective and 'manifestly absurd'. A spokeswoman for the n.f.u. said, "We believe that the regulation should never have been introduced in the first place." [33] Yet again, there is one law for pharmers and another for everyone else.

April 23rd 1998: Clare Tomkins: 25th Victim of Bse-Cjd.

Clare tomkins dies, "Vegetarian clare tomkins yesterday lost her battle with cjd .. She was the 25th victim ..." [34] She had been diagnozed in august last year as having bse-cjd.

April 23rd 1998: Daily Express joins Purdey's Campaign against Bse.

The express carries an article about clare tomkins's death. The editor (who believes she was the 22nd victim) pours cold water on the idea that bse derives from Cattle feed and even Cattle, "Yesterday clare tomkins died. She is the 22nd briton to succumb to so-called "new strain" cjd, the human equivalent of mad cow disease. Faced with this fact (that she was a strict vegetarian for 12 years), the reflex scientific response was simply to mutter about a longer incubation period for cjd than previously thought. This is an obvious inference. But it is too easy. And it is certainly more comforting than the other possible inference - that the disease is not caused solely by eating beef. Or even by eating beef at all. It is difficult for experts to admit that a settled theory, in which time, effort, and reputation have been invested, might be wrong." [35]

April 23rd 1998: Express backs Campaign to Sack Cunningham.

Demands are beginning to emerge in various tory newspapers for the resignation/sacking of jack cunningham, "Tony blair was forced to defend the criminalization of T-bone steak lovers yesterday in an embarrassing row with the church. He said the beef ban would stay, even after the bishop of leicester condemned it as an attack on individual freedom on radio four. The rt rev tom butler .. said the ban was as sensible as a "dinosaur-on-the-bone ban". Increasing pressure on jack cunningham, widely tipped for the sack in a cabinet reshuffle, mr hague twice challenged mr blair to back him - to no avail." [36]

April 25th 1998: New Test for Scrapie - Still no Test for Bse in Cattle.

"A skin sample taken from a living sheep's eyelid can reveal whether it will develop the deadly disease scrapie. A similar test may also help spot cattle with mad cow disease before they show symptoms. Knowles says his group has recently detected PrP in samples from sheep less than one year old, which suggests that it may provide an accurate early diagnosis. He also hopes to try the test on british cattle to see if it can predict which animals will develop bse." [37]

April 25th 1998: Brutish Government still can't bring itself around to test Cattle for Bse.

"Even animals that don't become ill after being infected with the 'prions' thought to cause bse, scrapie and similar diseases can have enough of the proteins in their tissues to infect other animals, new research confirms. The finding raises again the possibility that animals such as pigs and chickens which ate feed thought to be tainted with bse prions, could harbour the infection. A spokesman for britain's agriculture ministry says that plans to survey the brains of healthy slaughtered cattle for Bse prions are being discussed. But there are no current plans to see whether tissues from pigs and chickens can transmit the disease to cows." [38] Fourteen years after the discovery of the disease the blairite econazis still refuse to test Cattle skulls in abattoirs for bse.

May 28th 1998: Beef Exports from Northern Ireland are resumed even though no Tests have been carried out to determine whether Cattle have Bse.

The european commission has agreed to allow northern ireland to resume beef exports because the province has implemented the Cattle tracking system, "Beef exports from northern ireland can begin again on monday, the european commission said yesterday. The move will be the first breach of the ban slapped on the u.k. during the mad cow disease scare two ears ago." [39]

1998: Rooker Reveals extent to which the Labour government is Succumbing to the Maffia: Food Standards Agency Disappearing up Pharmers Backsides.

Jeff rooker is a junior minister in the maffia and seems to have rapidly succumbed to the maffia's propaganda. He argues he doesn't want the new independent food agency to suffer from the same dilemmas as maff in representing both consumers and producers, "So we've left veterinary products and pesticides outside its remit, although we've given the FSA long-stop powers that it can use if it thinks things are not being done by the regulatory authorities to prevent food contamination." [40]

Rooker regurgitates the maffia's attempt to downplay the bse epidemic. Apparently, most pharmers have been totally unaffected by the disease, "Of the 120,000 farmers with Cattle in the country, two-thirds have never had a case of Bse. And most of those who have are the dairy herds involved in milk production. .. of the beef suckler herds 84% have never had a case of bse." [41] What this maffia propaganda tries to hide is firstly, that many farmers had bse-infected Animals but either sold them on the open market before the disease become too apparent, or sold them to cull-Cattle dealers, or secretly buried them. Secondly, that all beef suckler Cattle are the offspring of Cows in dairy herds.

Rooker regurgitates another maffia fact seeking to diminish the bse epidemic - thereby revealing his ignorance about the epidemiology of the disease. He highlights the proportion of pharmers with bse-infected herds, "And it gets smaller when you discount farms who have only had one case of bse. Roughly 35,000 farms have had bse. But 12,000 of those have only a single case." [42] Yes indeed, the proportion of pharmers would be negligible if you ignored bse fatalities. There are a number of reasons why so many pharmers appear to have only one case of bse, "What seems to happen however is that once a herd has had one case, it is more likely to get another than a herd that has not already had a case. One explanation of this is that once a farmer has seen one cow with bse he was more able to recognise it again. However, the advice that I get from farmers is the opposite; once a farmer has recognised the first case he knows what to look for in a second case and takes it to market. Farmers talk about "infected herds" as if a single case of bse on the herd taints it in some way and represents a chance that other cattle are infected. This would explain why few farms have seen a large number infected but there has been a large number of affected farms." [43] Pharmers are able to recognize subsequent cases of bse much earlier than the first and take these Animals to market before the reputation of their herds is ruined.

Much more serious, however, is that the low-victim phenomena reveals a very dangerous trend in the transmission of bse. Dealler believes it is one of the most remarkable features of the bse epidemic that so many pharmers suffered only a few cases of bse. If the disease was being spread solely by infected feed then it would be highly surprising for only one Animal in a herd to be affected. Dealler believes the low rate of bse fatalities per herd is because bse is now as endemic amongst Cattle as scrapie is amongst Sheep and is being passed on primarily by maternal transmission.