Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy (TSE): A family of progressive, incurable, fatal diseases caused by prions. Characterized by dementia, and holes in the brain on autopsy. Can be transmitted between mammals when one mammal eats parts of the nervous system (e.g., brain, spinal cord) of another mammal.
Prion (pronounced pree-on): Novel infectious agent common to these diseases. Not a virus or bacterium, but an infectious protein which can set off a chain reaction which destroys nerve cells. They cannot be inactivated by most sterilization methods.
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE): The technical name for Mad Cow Disease - the TSE found in cattle. The form of BSE found in European cattle is probably not the same as that in US cattle.
Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD): A human TSE. The classic form of CJD appears to arise spontaneously, but the so-called "new variant" of CJD (nvCJD) is now known to be the human equivalent of mad cow disease thought to be contracted by eating contaminated beef.
Kuru: Another human TSE, found in Pacific Islanders who ate human brains.
Scrapie: The TSE found in sheep. The probable source of all other animal TSEs.
Downer cow: US industry term for an animal who falls down and dies without an apparent disease. Some people speculate that some US downer cows have a form of BSE with different symptoms from the British form of BSE.
Before there was Fast Food Nation, there was Mad Cow USA. Those who read this book when it first appeared in 1997 were shocked but not surprised on December 23, 2003, when the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture announced that mad cow disease had been found in America.
Six years earlier, Stauber and Rampton warned in Mad Cow USA that government and industry in the US had failed to take the necessary steps to prevent this bizarre and deadly dementia disease from spreading through contaminated feed into livestock and humans.
The feeding of rendered slaughterhouse waste to livestock, which spreads mad cow disease and created an epidemic in England, continues to be both legal and widespread in the United States. Dairy calves are literally weaned on cattle blood protein in calf milk formula, while government and industry feed the American public a dangerous diet of outright lies, false assurances and deceptive PR.
Michael Greger, MD, is the Mad Cow Coordinator for the Organic Consumers Association and the Chief BSE Investigator for Farm Sanctuary. Dr. Greger has been speaking publicly about mad cow disease since 1993. He has debated the National Cattlemen's Beef Association before the FDA and was invited as an expert witness at the Oprah Winfrey infamous "meat defamation" trial. He has contributed to many books and articles on
Dr. Greger is a graduate of the Cornell University School of Agriculture and the Tufts University School of Medicine. He can be reached for media inquiries at 206-312-8640 or by email. For periodic updates on Dr. Greger's Mad Cow writings and commentary, send a blank email to DrGregerMadCowUpdates-subscribe@lists.riseup.net