Mad cow case bolsters N.Y. lawsuit, lawyer says
 |
Story Tools
VIDEO
|
CNN's Chris Huntington on how the scare could ruin a year of recovery for U.S. beef.
CNN's Holly Firfer on the government's assertions that the food supply is safe.
CNN's Soledad O'Brien talks to U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman.
|
YOUR E-MAIL ALERTS
|
Follow the news that matters to you. Create your own alert to be notified on topics you're interested in.
Or, visit Popular Alerts for suggestions.
|
|
NEW YORK (Reuters) -- The first U.S. case of mad cow disease will strengthen a recently reinstated lawsuit against the government aimed at stopping the sale of "downed" animals for human food, a lawyer in the case said Wednesday.
"Downed" is an industry term describing livestock that collapse and are unable to stand up, usually for unknown reasons.
Just last week the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York reversed a trial court's finding that the plaintiffs in the suit could not sue the U.S. Department of Agriculture because there had never been a reported case of mad cow disease in the United States.
The appeals panel disagreed and said the plaintiffs did not need to point to a domestic case of the disease to allege a credible risk of harm. The panel sent the case back to the district judge for further proceedings.
Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman said Tuesday the disease, bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, had been found in a single Holstein cow in Washington state.
"It will certainly strengthen our case," said Sheldon Eisenberg, a Santa Monica, California. lawyer who filed the suit. He is representing Farm Sanctuary, an animal protection group that runs shelters in New York and California, and Fordham University professor Michael Baur.
Baur said that he was suing as "a regular consumer of meat products" concerned about the risk of mad cow disease.
Eisenberg said the government had argued that the case should be thrown out because the plaintiffs' claims were too speculative. "This report now removes that argument," he said.
Without deciding the merits of the case, the district judge concluded that since there had not been a case of mad cow disease in the United States, the risk to the food supply was too hypothetical to allow the plaintiffs to sue the USDA.
The plaintiffs argued in the suit that downed livestock are likely to be infected with BSE because it causes animals to lose coordination and ability to stand.
Under current USDA regulations, downed livestock may be used for human consumption after passing a mandatory post-mortem inspection by a veterinary officer.
Copyright 2003
Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
