Disparate Federal Rules in Spotlight

A worker throws a piece of meat among cattle carcass scraps dropped into a truck at the Hallmark Meat Packing slaughterhouse in Chino, Calif., in this Jan. 30 file photo. (By Damian Dovarganes -- Associated Press)

Another concern is that such animals may have been lying in feces, raising the risk of contamination by E. coli and salmonella bacteria.

In January 2004, then-Agriculture Secretary Ann M. Veneman announced a ban on meat from all downer cattle, a measure seen as helping to restore confidence in U.S.-produced beef. But documents show that on Jan. 12, 2004, the same day an interim rule codifying the ban was published in the Federal Register, the USDA issued written guidance informing its veterinary medical officers that they could approve downers that pass initial inspection but later suffer an acute injury.

In a January 2006 audit, the department's inspector general criticized that exception as "inconsistent with both published regulations and public policy announcements." Moreover, the IG found that inspectors were not enforcing even the lesser standard. Reviews of 12 plants revealed that 20 of 29 downers slaughtered for food had no accompanying documentation of an acute injury, the audit found.

The USDA codified the downer exception in a final rule issued on July 13, 2007.

Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), chairman of a Senate Appropriations subcommittee, last month called on the USDA to ban all downers from the food supply. Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer rejected that idea as unnecessary.

"I'm convinced that the rules in place are such that we're protecting the food supply," Schafer testified before the subcommittee.

As to why the California plant was processing downers at all, Williams said the USDA's beef suppliers also sell to the commercial market. They are required to have a plan to segregate downer meat from meat going to school lunches, he said, but Westland/Hallmark failed to follow the agency's protocols.

The beef industry and key members of the Agriculture committees on Capitol Hill have fiercely resisted an outright ban on downers, a position Pacelle says is self-defeating. Fewer than 500,000 of the 35 million cattle slaughtered annually in the United States are downers, he said.

"The industry lost billions of dollars because of the mad cow case in 2003 because we had this permissive policy with downers," Pacelle said. "I am absolutely confounded as to why the industry is prepared to assume this level of risk for the very minimal financial return from slaughtering downers."