WASHINGTON - The Humane Society of the United States has issued the following statement on the first-ever finding of mad cow disease in the United States:

"We have been warning for years that ‘downed animals’ represent the greatest threat of spreading Mad Cow Disease in the United States,” states Wayne Pacelle, a senior vice president of The Humane Society of the United States. “Sadly, it appears that our well-grounded predictions have been realized. It is time for USDA to impose an immediate ban on the slaughter of any downed animals for human consumption.”

Earlier this year, the Senate approved an amendment, advanced by Senator Daniel Akaka (D-HI), to ban the processing of any “downed animals” for human consumption. The House narrowly rejected a similar amendment by Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY). A House-Senate conference committee jettisoned this provision in the Fiscal Year 2004 Omnibus appropriations bill, which has not been adopted in its final form.

The HSUS charged that the USDA has wildly exaggerated its safety procedures for testing of BSE. According to the USDA and the General Accounting Office, USDA is testing fewer than 10 percent of “downed animals” that find their way into the food supply. “By allowing the continued processing of downed animals, we are playing Russian roulette with the American food supply.”

The HSUS and other animal welfare groups – most notably Farm Sanctuary – have long argued that downed animals are severely abused in transport in handling. Often the animals are dragged with chains or pushed with bulldozers to get them into slaughterhouses. The groups have also argued that sick and diseased animals should not be finding their way into the food supply.

The “mad cow” found in Canada earlier this year was a downed animal, prompting the president of the Alberta Beef Producers to remark, “Cows too sick to walk, too sick to stand, have no business being part of the food system. This animal should never have left the farm.”

Once the crisis struck in Canada, the agriculture department's food safety officials called for a ban on transport of downed animals to slaughterhouses. They learned the hard way -- following the detection of a single mad cow case, Canada's meat industry suffered a loss of more than $1 billion in sales, as a result of a beef boycott by the U.S. and some 30 other countries.

The HSUS is the nation’s largest animal protection organization with nearly 8 million members and constituents.