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In the same show Weber asserted that no animal could ever enter a US packing plant displaying BSE symptoms[131]. Even if this is true, the majority of infected and infectious cattle become beef before clinical symptoms arise.[58] In fact, for every "mad " cow incinerated in the UK, there may be hundreds slaughtered and sold to butchers before any overt symptoms develop.[51] Narang estimates that a third of all English cattle going into the food chain are infected with BSE.[133] Because of this, it is estimated that every adult in the UK has eaten on average 50 meals containing tissue from infected cattle[126]. 
The debatedly [70] novel[3] infectious agents that cause spongiform encephalopathies like CJD and BSE evoke no immune response [50] and consequently may slowly accumulate[14] for an invisible latency period of up to 30 years.[60] No one knows how many people have already been infected. John Pattison, Dean of the University College of London Medical School and Chairman of the British government's Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee (SEAC), thinks there could be 500,000 people already incubatin g CJD[27]. "At this stage," he adds," we have to say it's totally unpredictable."[88] Needless to say, he does not feed beef to his grandson[82]. Microbiologist Steven Dealler, secretary of the Spongiform Encephalopathy Research Campaign, places the possible death count at 2 million people[118]. Professor Pattison reportedly agreed with this worst case scenario assessment.[118] This could mean up to a half million deaths a year as the epidemic peaks into the next century according to Richard Lacey[64] , a microbiology consultant for the World Health Organization and child health specialist.[68]
Called the "most intriguing, unsolved puzzle in modern biology"[141], it is now close to being generally accepted that the cause of both the disease in humans and cows isn't a virus or a bacteria, but a "prion", an infectious protein.[78] Not only is it not known how they replicate[6], the whole concept challenges the basic tenets of biology.[45] Because of their unique makeup, they are practically invulnerable. They are not adequately destroyed by cooking[13], canning[14], nor freezing.[40] Chemicals or enzymes which degrade nucleic acids[55], proteolytic enzymes of the digestive tract[49], and usable doses of UV or ionizing radiation[40] are all ineffective in destroying their infectivity. Even heat sterilization[40], domestic bleach[59a], and formal dehyde[14] sterilization have little or no effect. In fact, the only way to ensure that one's burger is safe is to marinate it in Drain-O (or other concentrated alkali).[59] They are the smallest[9], most lethal self-perpetuating biological entities in th e world.[74] In six years, BSE has gone from the most serious threat ever posed to British agriculture[44] to what the Prime Minister calls the worst crisis to confront the government in general, since the Falklands War.[72] Widespread fear first struck in 1989[19]. Only months after the government concluded that the disease probably wouldn't spread to other species[1], Max, someone's pet Siamese, died of a hitherto unknown feline spongiform encephalopathy[68]. BSE-infected pet food was "overwhelmingly the most li kely explanation."[36] And then zoo animals started dropping dead.[4] Together, this sparked a public uproar[19] with unprecedented media attention.[50] Fearing its spread into the human population, hospitals[34], nursing homes[34], and over 2000 schools[ 21], affecting over 750,000 school children[7], stopped serving beef or restricted its consumption. By May 1990, a quarter of the population reportedly refused to eat beef.[38] In six months beef prices dropped 10[5]-25%[3], devastating the cattle indust ry. The final blow came when Australia[43], Israel[43], and a dozen other countries[24] banned the importation of British beef because of the BSE epidemic.
After a $6.5 million advertising campaign touting red-meat consumption, from Britain's Meat and Livestock Commission[34], though, and the Minister of Agriculture munching burgers with Cordelia[100], ed from cattle considered to be higher at risk[117].

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