"Robert J. Bradbury" wrote:
>
> On Thu, 22 Mar 2001, Michael Lorrey wrote:
>
> > nor can sheep get Mad Cow disease.
>
> Not true Mike. Sheep get "scrapie" which is their variant of MCD.
> I think in fact the cows got it from being fed the remains of sheep.
> I have not heard though that pigs can get it.
Scrapie is a form of spongiform encephalopathy, but is not caused by the
same bugs. Its a variant. You can't feed MCD infected cow brains to
sheep and get scrapie.
>
> > What this episode is about is twofold: the cow dairy industry wants
> > them out of business, as does a New York City importer of european
> > cheeses made from milk of the same Belgian sheep.
>
> Could you explain the reasoning behind this? [I may be missing some
> details you are aware of.]
The sheep are produce large quantities of rich milk, so much so that
they are more efficient, allegedly, than BGH fed cows for a given amount
of pastureland. If you increase the supply of American made sheep
cheeses, they will compete better with cowmilk cheeses, and will
underbid their sheep competitors from europe that are imported here.
Seizing and destroying the entire species eliminates the sheep-milk
industry versus the cowmilk industry competition and protects the market
for high priced imported sheep cheese.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Mon May 28 2001 - 09:59:42 MDT