USDA Hides Behind the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis

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"When Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman met a House panel last week to defend her response to mad cow disease, she cited a Harvard University study concluding the risk to public health is minimal. ... The Harvard study, released two years ago, has become a universal defense for Bush administration officials as they have responded to the first cases of bovine spongiform encephalopathy in Canada and then in the United States. But in their rush to embrace 'sound science,' Veneman and others at times mischaracterized the study's purpose, recommendations or conclusions, according to a review by The Oregonian." The USDA paid the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis $800,000 to produce a computer modeling study designed to deny and downplay mad cow risks in the US. Far from being an academic institution, the Harvard Center is an industry-funded front group specializing in producing risk assessments that favor its Fortune 500 supporters. Director George Gray is on the board of the industry-funded right-wing Foundation for Research and the Environment (FREE), and he and the Center's David Reopik recently penned a piece for FREE ridiculing concerns over mad cow disease.