Let’s remember when the first US case of mad cow disease was reported near Yakima, on this day in 2003 (December 23)
The outbreak of mad cow disease was both a very big deal in 2003, and the subject of way too many late night talk show jokes. But the US outbreak began in a town I hadn’t heard of, Mabton, in Yakima County.
According to Kit Oldham at HistoryLink:
On December 23, 2003, Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman announces that a Holstein cow from a dairy herd in Mabton, a small farming town in southeast Yakima County, has tested positive for mad cow disease. It is the first time the invariably fatal degenerative brain disease, which can spread to humans who eat infected cow parts, is detected in the United States. The discovery heightens concern about food safety and has immediate impacts on the cattle industry and on Mabton.
Mabton is a town of about 2,000 residents in the Yakima valley some 33 miles southeast of the city of Yakima. Agriculture is the main industry in the area, as it has been from the time the town was first settled in the late 1800s.
The Holstein cow that tested positive for mad cow disease, officially known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), was part of a 4,000-cow dairy herd at the Sunny Dene Ranch located about a mile south of Mabton’s Main Street. The cow was slaughtered at Vern’s Moses Lake Meats on December 9, 2003, after becoming paralyzed apparently while giving birth.
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