Disparate Federal Rules in Spotlight
Critics Cite Mixed Messages Over Risk From Downer Cows

By Christopher Lee
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 9, 2008

Although the Agriculture Department prohibits the use of beef from "downer" cattle in federally funded school lunches, the agency sometimes allows the meat in the general food supply, a disparity that critics say undercuts officials' contention that there is no food safety reason to ban meat from all cows too sick or injured to stand.

The tougher standard also raises questions about why a major supplier to the school lunch program was processing downers when it was found in January to be treating them inhumanely.

Federal officials ordered recall of 143 million pounds of beef processed by Westland/Hallmark Meat Co. in Chino, Calif. -- including 37 million pounds that had gone to public nutrition programs. It was the largest such recall in U.S. history. No illnesses have been tied to the meat.

Wayne Pacelle, president of the Humane Society of the United States, which sent a worker undercover to videotape mistreatment at the plant, said the disparate standards for school lunch meat and commercial beef make no sense.

"It's grounded on hypocrisy in that we are forbidding beef from downer cows for 30 million school children, but we're allowing downer cows to be fed to those same kids when they are home, as well as to 270 million other Americans," said Pacelle, whose group favors a prohibition on all downer meat. "It's an entirely inconsistent policy."

The USDA adopted the ban for federal food and nutrition programs in 2000. Technical specifications for USDA suppliers routinely include the line, "Meat from carcasses of non-ambulatory disabled cattle will not be included in USDA purchased ground beef products."

In contrast, regulations allow a government veterinarian to approve for slaughter for human consumption an animal that passed initial inspection but went down before reaching the "knock box," if the second inspection determines that the animal was not sick and merely had an injury such as a broken leg.

"There really is no inconsistency," Keith Williams, a USDA spokesman, said. "Federal purchase requirements exclude meat from non-ambulatory animals based on animal welfare considerations, not food safety concerns."

He said the department adopted the requirement to ensure good animal-handling practices in response to feedback from school lunch operators that the welfare of the animals was an emerging concern.

In recent years, however, the department also has cited the no-downer policy as part of its effort to ensure food safety. A fact sheet on mad cow disease posted on the USDA's Web site poses the question, "Are meats used in the National School Lunch Program safe?" It answers, in part, by noting that USDA standards "specifically prohibit the use of meat from downer animals."

Concerns about downer cattle and the safety of U.S.-produced beef rose dramatically after the 2003 discovery that a slaughtered downer cow in Washington state was infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease. At least 44 countries subsequently closed their borders to U.S. beef for varying periods.

Mad cow disease is extremely rare in the United States, but of 15 documented cases in North America, most in Canada, the majority have been traced to downer cattle.

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."