ASK any number of consumer and public health groups and they will say that veterinary scientists in the US have been asleep at the wheel. For years, the advocates have urged the Department of Agriculture to do what Europe, and especially the UK, does: keep 鈥渄owners鈥� 鈥� sick or lame cattle 鈥� out of human food, and test a lot more cattle for BSE than 20,000 of the 35 million killed each year.
Now it is too late. Most of the world has stopped buying American beef, even though the single offending Holstein discovered with the disease in December 2003 was born and probably contracted the disease in Canada. The US agriculture department is scrambling to get downers out of the food chain and do more tests. It is making sure there is no central nervous system tissue, the known vector for the killer prion that causes BSE, in American hamburgers. And it is reassuring consumers that even if it did finally happen here, it cannot happen here again. One reason is that the inspectors will be using better BSE test kits in the slaughterhouses 鈥� kits invented and made in Europe. As the saying goes, if we can put a robot on Mars, why can鈥檛 we keep out mad cows?
SMILES all around, at least for a while. Although NASA isn鈥檛 back in contact with the Spirit rover as we write this, the mission鈥檚 early successes allowed Americans to feel part of a can-do country again. No matter the future of President Bush鈥檚 ambitious space plans, no matter the soaring deficit, no matter the threat of terrorism. For a few weeks, the attitude around Washington was best captured by the words of NASA鈥檚 administrator Sean O鈥橩eefe: 鈥淲e鈥檙e back.鈥�
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THINGS seem to be getting a little political again for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). During the early days of the Bush administration, a National Cancer Institute (NCI) website discussed the possibility that women who had abortions might be at increased risk of breast cancer. Most scientists believe the figures backing up that claim are weak, and ultimately an NCI advisory panel agreed with the scientists.
Then last year a conservative group convinced Congress to launch an investigation into the NIH-funded research dealing with human sexuality. Some 190 grants came under scrutiny. The researchers say the work is appropriate, since understanding human sexual behaviour is critical for understanding how to stop sexually transmitted diseases.
The NIH told Congress it agrees with its researchers, and that may be the end of it. But the Bush administration and its allies in Congress have shown a willingness to take its anti-abortion, 鈥減ro-family鈥� principles as far as possible, so the NIH may find itself mixing politics and science more often.
