Editing Cattle feeding (section)

====Bovine spongiform encephalopathy====
{{Main|Bovine spongiform encephalopathy}}

[[Meat and bone meal]] can be a risk factor for [[bovine spongiform encephalopathy]] (BSE), when healthy animals consume tainted tissues from infected animals. People concerned about [[Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease]] (CJD), which is also a spongiform encephalopathy, may favor grass-fed cattle for this reason. In the United States, this risk is relatively low as feeding of protein sources from any ruminant to another ruminant has been banned since 1997.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2004pres/20040126.html |title=2004.01.26: Expanded "Mad Cow" Safeguards Announced To Strengthen Existing Firewalls Against BSE Transmission |publisher=US Department of Health and Human Services |date=January 26, 2004 |access-date=November 8, 2009 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080714215823/http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2004pres/20040126.html |archive-date = July 14, 2008}}</ref> The problem becomes more complicated as other feedstuffs containing animal by-products are still allowed to be fed to other non-ruminants (chickens, cats, dogs, horses, pigs, etc.). Therefore, at a feed mill mixing feed for pigs, for instance, there is still the possibility of cross-contamination of feed going to cattle.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Sapkota |first1=Amy |title=What Do We Feed to Food-Production Animals? A Review of Animal Feed Ingredients and Their Potential Impacts on Human Health |journal=Environmental Health Perspectives |year=2007 |volume=115 |issue=5 |pages=663–670 |publisher=NIH |doi=10.1289/ehp.9760 |pmid=17520050 |pmc=1867957 |bibcode=2007EnvHP.115..663S }}</ref> Since only a tiny amount of the contaminating [[prion]] begins the cascading brain disease, any amount of mixed feed could cause many animals to become infected.{{Citation needed|date=September 2008}} This was the only traceable link among the cattle with BSE in Canada that led to the recent US embargo of Canadian beef.{{Citation needed|date=September 2008}} No cases of BSE have been reported so far in Australia. This is largely due to Australia's strict quarantine and biosecurity rules that prohibit beef imports from countries known to be infected with BSE.{{Cn|date=December 2024}}

However, according to a report filed in ''The Australian'' on February 25, 2010, those rules were suddenly relaxed and the process to submit beef products from known BSE-infected countries was allowed (pending an application process).<ref>{{cite news| url=http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/mad-scramble-over-beef-imports/story-e6frgczf-1225834044470 |title=Mad scramble over beef imports | first=Adam | last=Cresswell | newspaper=The Australian | date= February 25, 2010}}</ref> But less than a week later, Tony Burke, the Australian Minister For Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry overturned the decision and placed a 'two year stop' on all fresh and chilled beef products destined for Australia from BSE known countries of origin, thereby relaxing fears held by Australians that contaminated US beef would find its way onto Australian supermarket shelves after a long absence.<ref>{{cite web | author=Jamie | title=Agriculture minister overturns beef import decision | work=Slow Food in Australia | date=March 11, 2010 | url=http://slowfoodaustralia.com.au/2010/03/agriculture-minister-overturns-beef-import-decision/ | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110328001442/http://slowfoodaustralia.com.au/2010/03/agriculture-minister-overturns-beef-import-decision/ | archive-date=March 28, 2011 | df=mdy-all }}{{self-published source|date=December 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | last=Schefe | first=Roseanne | title=Beef imports get go ahead | work=[[Toowoomba Chronicle]] | date=March 1, 2010 | url=http://www.thechronicle.com.au/news/beef-imports-get-go-ahead/477989/}}</ref>

Soybean meal is cheap and plentiful in the United States. As a result, the use of animal byproduct feeds was never common, as it was in Europe. However, US regulations only partially prohibit the use of animal byproducts in feed. In 1997, regulations prohibited the feeding of mammalian byproducts to [[ruminant]]s such as cattle and goats. However, the byproducts of ruminants can still be legally fed to [[pet food|pets]] or other livestock such as pigs and poultry such as chickens. In addition, it is legal for ruminants to be fed byproducts from some of these animals.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/madcowusa00shel |title=Mad Cow USA – Center for Media and Democracy |publisher=PR Watch |date=2004-10-27 |access-date=November 8, 2009 |isbn=978-1-56751-110-9 |url-access=registration }}{{page needed|date=August 2021}}</ref>