Soldiers Ran Risk Of Mad Cow Disease
No cases, but military is trying to ‘allay alarm’
By Anita Manning, USA Today
Millions of U.S. military personnel and their families stationed in Europe before 1996 may have eaten British beef on base during the height of the mad cow epidemic, military records show.
For 10 years after the emergence of mad cow disease in British cattle in 1986, commissaries on U.S. bases in Europe were supplied beef from the United Kingdom. There were no bans on British beef on U.S. military bases until 1996, when the world learned that the disease had jumped to humans through the consumption of infected beef.
No U.S. military personnel have been diagnosed with the human form of the disease, and federal health experts estimate the risk from consumption of British beef at "less than one per 10 billion servings," says Army Col. Scott Severin, deputy director of the Department of Defense's veterinary services.
Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, has spread across Europe and infected cattle in more than a dozen countries. More than 90 Europeans have contracted the human form of the disease, a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease that causes dementia and death. Victims may have been infected 10 years or more before symptoms appeared.
Scientists don't know how many others might be infected.
Last week, the American Forces Press Service produced articles on the disease for military newspapers, says Virginia Stephanakis of the Army Medical Department.
"We feel we owed them accurate information, to let them know there is a risk, albeit very small, and try to allay a sense of alarm," Stephanakis says.
Only U.S. beef has been served in military dining halls since 1980. But until 1990, about 35% of the beef sold in commissary stores was from the U.K. After 1990, British beef continued to be sold on some U.S. bases until the ban in 1996.