Now they want to move it mainland. The disease reseached there is the type of hoof and mouth disease that had Britain killing all theeir cows. They said they ran simulations of an outbreak.

The sim had americans rioting amid massive food shortages., the national guard was instructed to kill the animals and ran out of bullets. They had to dig a 25 mile long trench to bury the carcasses.

The current location is Plum island. The current director would suggest a place that has no commercial livestock industry like long island.

Homeland security says labs contaiment procedures have improved to the point where the virus wouldn't escape, but the current director wonders wh they's go against security procedures of the last 50 year (keeping that stuff on an island.

I wonder the same thing.

Just more government stupidity.

They could research the disease anywhere in the world. Why not pick a place with zero chance of it ever reaching the U.S. cattle population, like in the middle of the desert in Africa or something.

And all the simulations are done on a computer anyway. It's not like they need the actual virus there to do that.

Or Iraq

Or France

They make Zig-Zag rolling papers in france though

It was suggested years ago that the research be done in an isolated environment that never experienced the disease or was not subject to it. That place would be somewhere livestock had yet to be introduced. Narrows the field considerably and cattle can't survive desert conditions.

Computer simulations are valuable instruments in studying the disease, but aren't helpful in determining what actually occurs in the field. How the disease spreads throughout the herd, how the disease can "jump" to other areas miles apart, and preventing the spread.

Is human or equipment interaction the only means of spreading the disease. What about farms located 20, 30, even 50 miles apart that are infected? What role do birds and incests play in spreading the disease?

In the event of an outbreak, how far is the quarantine area? The radius from ground zero?? And the question every one is keeping under tight wraps, Can the virus that causes the disease jump (mutate), in whats called "Antigenic drift or Antigenic shift" to human infection without direct consumption of the infected by product?

To answer some of the questions, the actual field research has to be done and labs, islands and remote locations have limits. Finding the ultimate cure, or rather prevention of this disease is like trying to cure the common cold. Almost impossible and the risk are high.

The "new" regulations involving livestock and herd management are unbelievable in the US now. A cousin, in the commercial dairy business, spends over 30% of his time filing the required Federal paperwork on a monthly bases. It's almost as bad as the Tax codes and expensive.

In essence, almost every farm or livestock operation dealing with products that come in direct contact with humans are a working lab in the field. It's also a time bomb just waiting to explode.

There is something the FDA won't tell you though. It's not a matter of IF we have an outbreak here, but rather WHEN.

And we aren't talking millions or even billions of dollars in revenue, but rather Trillions.

Not to mention millions and millions in terms of human lives.

IF the American public knew what the people that deal with livestock know, that alone would make everyone stop eating red meat.

I'm not sure I wanna know. I luz me some steaks!! *mu*6^

The more I read of this the more I think it's bat daffytarded.

Google Accidents at disease lab acknowledged