We had a single find of BSE in this country. And we believe that what we’re doing is appropriate action taken in an abundance of caution under the circumstances. And I believe it’s the right thing to do. Ann Veneman Read Quote
We are doing everything we can to protect the food supply. And I can tell you that we’re making decisions based upon sound science and good public policy, given the circumstances that we are now in. Ann Veneman Read Quote
I think that’s unjustified criticism. We have had a number of measures in place in this country for several years to mitigate the possibility of mad cow spreading in this country. We have found a single case. Ann Veneman Read Quote
I’m confident that we have measures in place. And the additional measures that we announced yesterday will be even more protective of our food supply in this country. Ann Veneman Read Quote
We’ve all learned about this disease since it was first discovered several years ago in Europe. And so I think we’ve learned from the European experience. Ann Veneman Read Quote
Great Britain had a much different situation than we do and did here in the United States, in that they had literally thousands of infected animals with human health risks. Their infectivity in this disease happened before very much was known about it. Ann Veneman Read Quote
We’ve had risk assessments performed by Harvard University, which said that even if we did have a small number of cases in this country that the likelihood of it spreading or getting into any kind of human health problem is very, very small. Ann Veneman Read Quote
It’s been studied to the point where we know that the impact on humans would be from consuming the most infected parts of the cow; that is, the brain and the spinal cord. Ann Veneman Read Quote
