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Bovaer to be added to cattle feed

Docb said:
One thing that comes with that comes with that culture is an appreciation that safety is relative, not absolute. Nothing is absolutely safe, it is just that one thing is safer than other. It also makes you think about risk and quantifying that risk. You can then set standards whereby a risk is considered to be of no consequence. That standard would be related to consequences but it allows decisions to be made on a rational rather than an emotional basis.

What I find interesting in the discussion in threads of this sort is the way concern about the infinitesimally low risks associated with a food additive for cattle is expressed by people who no doubt quite happily travel in motor cars, a form of transport that kills and maims people daily. Much higher risks become acceptable in when a situation is familiar.
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Yes: I remember when I was walking down a staircase in a BNFL building once, someone passing on the other side told me to use the handrail, which I wasn't - and pointed out how many accidents are caused by people tripping on stairs! Apparently BNFL embedded 'safety behaviour' into every aspect of their work - not just in terms of handling nuclear material. Whenever I was on site I was more concerned about somehow becoming radioactive, rather than the much greater risk of falling down stairs!
 
Bruce Stephens said:
I think they still caused (rarely) significant harm. There just wasn't much that could be done about it since the vaccines weren't yet routinely available. The sugar lump was, I think, OPV, for polio. We switched entirely to IPV a bit later.
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Being given a sugar lump made it all worthwhile, for me as a small kid!
 
CliffH said:
Being given a sugar lump made it all worthwhile, for me as a small kid!
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Yes, I remember that too. (And I'm sure I remember BCG. I presume I had other vaccines but I don't remember them.) Because it's eaten you get a mucosal response (so for a month or three you don't transmit poliovirus). On the negative side it can revert and itself cause paralysis and death. Bit of a negative, really. We really should switch over the world to IPV as soon as possible even though it probably can't result in eliminating the virus so we may end up stuck with vaccinating forever.
 
I'm glad no-one told me (or my parents) about "paralysis and death" 😱
 
CliffH said:
Yes: I remember when I was walking down a staircase in a BNFL building once, someone passing on the other side told me to use the handrail, which I wasn't - and pointed out how many accidents are caused by people tripping on stairs! Apparently BNFL embedded 'safety behaviour' into every aspect of their work - not just in terms of handling nuclear material. Whenever I was on site I was more concerned about somehow becoming radioactive, rather than the much greater risk of falling down stairs!
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At one point (forget exactly when) an analysis of accidents within BNFL showed quite clearly that when it came to nuclear matters, the company safety record was impeccable but when it came to straightforward industrial safety, performance was distinctly average. There was a big internal campaign to improve this based on the idea that mitigating risks associated with everyday things would set standards which would reflect on less everyday things. Holding hand rails on stairs was one of those simple things.
 
Docb said:
At one point (forget exactly when) an analysis of accidents within BNFL showed quite clearly that when it came to nuclear matters, the company safety record was impeccable but when it came to straightforward industrial safety, performance was distinctly average. There was a big internal campaign to improve this based on the idea that mitigating risks associated with everyday things would set standards which would reflect on less everyday things. Holding hand rails on stairs was one of those simple things.
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I worked with BNFL between 1998 and (I think) 2000: what you say sounds familiar, so I'm guessing that the initiative that you mention would have been around that time.
 
Satan’s little helper said:
Then look up what humans contribute to this with the belching & farts.& it looks like a little “side step” where we take the blame for just agriculture?
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Humans are much smaller than cows and we have a wildly different diet and digestive system, so there's no particular reason to think we excrete methane even in proportion to our size. I suspect we excrete much less (like other omnivores).
 
Bruce Stephens said:
Humans are much smaller than cows and we have a wildly different diet and digestive system, so there's no particular reason to think we excrete methane even in proportion to our size. I suspect we excrete much less (like other omnivores).
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Just a flavour of my train of thought. But hey, I’m not a cow. 😉

FIRST THEY CAME
By Martin Niemöller

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me.
 
Docb said:
At one point (forget exactly when) an analysis of accidents within BNFL showed quite clearly that when it came to nuclear matters, the company safety record was impeccable but when it came to straightforward industrial safety, performance was distinctly average. There was a big internal campaign to improve this based on the idea that mitigating risks associated with everyday things would set standards which would reflect on less everyday things. Holding hand rails on stairs was one of those simple things.
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To me, it appears that everything (e.g construction, manufacturing, health and safety, building safety) apart form drugs and vaccines etc, there is a safety cut off.

Say you had a ladder on a building site and there were 1,2, then a 3rd etc accident due to a fault or safety issue, one would fairly quickly come to a conclusion and would say lets remove/change the ladder its not safe. But; in the world of drugs and vaccines (and now cattle "feed") etc, there appears to be no cut off. Instead they just add the safety event to the list and keep adding and adding. Sometimes it can take 20 years before anyone acts and pulls the product.
 
Amity Island said:
To me, it appears that everything (e.g construction, manufacturing, health and safety, building safety) apart form drugs and vaccines etc, there is a safety cut off.

Say you had a ladder on a building site and there were 1,2, then a 3rd etc accident due to a fault or safety issue, one would fairly quickly come to a conclusion and would say lets remove/change the ladder its not safe. But; in the world of drugs and vaccines (and now cattle "feed") etc, there appears to be no cut off. Instead they just add the safety event to the list and keep adding and adding. Sometimes it can take 20 years before anyone acts and pulls the product.
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I think that your analogy needs adjusting to be a closer fit. That is, removing a 'risky' ladder and simply expecting people to cope without it is analogous to removing a 'risky' vaccine and leaving herd immunity to manage the morbidity and mortality rates.

Better I guess to aim for continuous improvement of ladders and vaccines - whilst accepting that no ladder or vaccine can ever be completely safe and that trying to manage without either of them because of occasional (in statistical terms) serious or even fatal accidents isn't what we want in today's society.
 
Amity Island said:
To me, it appears that everything (e.g construction, manufacturing, health and safety, building safety) apart form drugs and vaccines etc, there is a safety cut off
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There certainly is a cut off in drugs and vaccines.

They have to be proven to be both effective and safe (in the vast majority of cases), and have a sufficiently low level of adverse events. Trials will be stopped early if the effectiveness is too small and/or the risk of serious adverse event is too high.

Food is a choking hazard. There are documented cases every year of people choking to death. Some foods give rise to allergies in some people, with debilitating or potentially fatal consequences. So food is not safe in the sense of never causing harm to anyone. But Governments still insist on parents feeding their children. And if a parent decided that they would not feed their children because they had researched food poisoning, food allergies, choking hazards, and were worried about the very real risks that food presented, action would be taken.
 
CliffH said:
I think that your analogy needs adjusting to be a closer fit. That is, removing a 'risky' ladder and simply expecting people to cope without it is analogous to removing a 'risky' vaccine and leaving herd immunity to manage the morbidity and mortality rates.

Better I guess to aim for continuous improvement of ladders and vaccines - whilst accepting that no ladder or vaccine can ever be completely safe and that trying to manage without either of them because of occasional (in statistical terms) serious or even fatal accidents isn't what we want in today's society.
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I’m thinking more along the lines of “dry cat food?” Convenient for the owner. But a potential risk to the longevity of the animal. (Kidney failure being one such documented result.)
 
CliffH said:
Yes, 'convenience' versus 'safety' is a pertinent trade-off - especially in terms of 'convenience foods' 🙄.
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I was on another part of the internet the other night regarding an “influencer” with an ethical food choice who had this cat? He “supported” the cat’s sharing in the owner’s diatary choice ignoring the vet on such matters. 3 years later back at the vet, kidneys screwed. Sadly, he publicly announced he had to “put it to sleep.” Ye cannee make this stuff up.
 
Amity Island said:
Say you had a ladder on a building site and there were 1,2, then a 3rd etc accident due to a fault or safety issue, one would fairly quickly come to a conclusion and would say lets remove/change the ladder its not safe.
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No actually
Id be asking.......
Is the ladder being used correctly?......3 points of contact?....is the person who had the accident wearing correct ppe ie safety footwear thats in good condition?....is footwear slippery?.......whats is the ladders location?....is it situated somewhere wet or muddy?.......is the ladder installed correctly?.......why is this ladder causing accidents and not others on the site?.....why has the ladder continued to be used after thefirst accident without an investigation?......have all all workers been given h&s breifings and signed off?

All those things are not the ladders fault but the human element of the operation

By the way in a previous life i was a fully qualified H&S professional
 
everydayupsanddowns said:
There certainly is a cut off in drugs and vaccines.

They have to be proven to be both effective and safe (in the vast majority of cases), and have a sufficiently low level of adverse events. Trials will be stopped early if the effectiveness is too small and/or the risk of serious adverse event is too high.
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Hi Mike,

I am only referring to post trial / on the shelf use products, not trials/testing. During the covid vaccine rollout for example, there was no limit (as far as I can see) given on adverse events or deaths e.g the products were never halted, they just got added to yellow card reports or not acted upon (mhra said they don't have the resources). The point I am trying to make is, how many deaths or injuries before they pull the product? What is the limit? 1? 2? In any other industry, a single death caused by a faulty or compromised or unsafe product would no doubt cause a halt, recall etc

Here's one of many examples.

www.bbc.co.uk

AstraZeneca vaccine deaths: Families ask why warnings not shared

Two families believe their loved ones would still be alive if vaccine warnings had been shared.
www.bbc.co.uk
 
paultrose said:
No actually
Id be asking.......
Is the ladder being used correctly?......3 points of contact?....is the person who had the accident wearing correct ppe ie safety footwear thats in good condition?....is footwear slippery?.......whats is the ladders location?....is it situated somewhere wet or muddy?.......is the ladder installed correctly?.......why is this ladder causing accidents and not others on the site?.....why has the ladder continued to be used after thefirst accident without an investigation?......have all all workers been given h&s breifings and signed off?

All those things are not the ladders fault but the human element of the operation

By the way in a previous life i was a fully qualified H&S professional
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I did say, fault or safety issue.

My point being action would be taken rather than just tallied up or recorded.

"On to the post-license phase. Other safety-critical sectors define absolute tolerable levels of in-service safety incidents and investigate them all. Not MHRA. They don’t define a tolerable level of harm, and they don’t investigate even just the fatal/serious Yellow Card reports and those involving children or pregnancy. It’s excuse is pathetic – it doesn’t have the resources (see slide 23 here)."

dailysceptic.org

Why Medicine Safety Will Get Worse Not Better – The Daily Sceptic

Nick Hunt diagnoses the U.K. medicines regulator's shortcomings relative to other industries, and the prognosis looks bleak. Root and branch reform is needed, but he's not holding his breath.
dailysceptic.org dailysceptic.org
 
Satan’s little helper said:
I was on another part of the internet the other night regarding an “influencer” with an ethical food choice who had this cat? He “supported” the cat’s sharing in the owner’s diatary choice ignoring the vet on such matters. 3 years later back at the vet, kidneys screwed. Sadly, he publicly announced he had to “put it to sleep.” Ye cannee make this stuff up.
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Was the cat making an 'informed' 'unwise decision', though, within the meaning of the Mental Capacity Act? :confused:
 
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