Farmers Fight Order to Destroy Sheep

Disgruntled Vermont farmers went to court Wednesday in an attempt to prevent the U.S. Department of Agriculture from destroying their sheep because they may carry an ailment similar to “mad cow” disease in cattle.

The USDA, which has been closely monitoring all American livestock since the 1996 outbreak of mad cow disease in Europe, wants to destroy sheep on three Vermont farms as a precaution.

Four sheep on farms tested positive earlier this month for a disease known as TSE, or transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, according to USDA officials.

TSE can cause scrapie, a fatal disease in sheep that leads to a progressive degeneration of the central nervous system. It is part of a family of diseases that includes the deadly BSE, bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease. The USDA said TSE has a 100% mortality rate.

No cases of BSE or mad cow disease have ever been found in the United States.

The government wants to buy all 376 sheep on the three farms by Friday and incinerate them. So far, one farmer in Lyndonville has agreed to sell his 21 sheep and was cooperating with the USDA.

The other farmers, Houghton Freeman of Stowe and Larry and Linda Faillace of East Warren, filed requests Wednesday in federal court in Burlington arguing that no sheep outside a laboratory has ever contracted the disease.

All the animals are offspring of sheep imported from Belgium and the Netherlands in 1996, before mad cow disease swept Europe and claimed at least 75 human lives in Britain.

Members of Vermont’s congressional delegation issued a statement Wednesday backing the destruction of the sheep.

“Our sympathies lie with these owners, but where the public health is concerned, safety must be the bottom line,” said the statement signed by Sens. Patrick J. Leahy, a Democrat, and James M. Jeffords, a Republican, and Rep. Bernard Sanders, an independent.