Class Action Update

[kato]

Spotted this on Ranchers.net

Mad cow settlement reached
Provided by: Sun Media
Written by: KEVIN MARTIN
May. 16, 2008

Source of Article: http://chealth.canoe.ca/channel_health_news_details.asp?channel_id=131&rel ation_id=1883&news_channel_id=131&news_id=25308

Feed mill owners to pay $6M which will be used to fund suit against feds
Lawyers for ranchers involved in a lawsuit over the mad cow fiasco have reached a partial settlement which will fund the multi-billion dollar lawsuit.

Ridley Inc., the owners of the St. Paul, Alta., feed mill where Ottawa believes the infection originated, have agreed to pay out $6 million.

"These monies will be used to fund the ongoing class actions against the Government of Canada," says the proposed settlement, which still requires court approval.

The proposal maintains Ridley's claim it is not liable for the spread of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) and says the agreement is a compromise.

Lawyer Clint Docken, who acts for Alberta ranchers in the national class-action claim, said the deal will allow the main court action to proceed.

"Essentially it's to provide a fund to pursue litigation against the Crown," Docken told Sun Media.

He said the two sides agreed to such a small amount compared to the overall claim because Ridley did nothing legally wrong in providing the contaminated feed.

"They were simply following the (federal government) protocol, they weren't doing anything unlawful," Docken said.

He said the claim against Ottawa on behalf of an estimated 100,000 Canadian ranchers -- 40% of whom live in Alberta -- could reach $20 billion.

The Calgary lawyer alleged the government was negligent in not preventing the spread of BSE, or mad cow disease, which forced the 2003, closure of the border to cattle exports and cost billions to Canadian ranchers.

He said federal official did nothing to stop its spread before the outbreak occurred.

"Their own risk managers told them if they don't do anything it's going to be catastrophic," Docken said.

Separate class actions have been filed in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario and Quebec.

The case goes before a Montreal court next Thursday, and lawyers in Toronto will seek approval of the deal June 9.

The Alberta case has been adjourned until those proceedings are completed.

[farmers_son]

http://www.albertafarmexpress.ca/issues/ISArticle.asp?id=83979&PC=FBC&issue=05072008

5/7/2008 12:48:00 AM

Feed manufacturer Ridley Inc. says it's reviewing options now that its Australian parent aims to sell its majority stake.

Ridley Corp., the Sydney, Australia feed and salt company that owns a 69 per cent controlling interest in TSX-traded Ridley Inc., has told the firm's board that it wants to sell, "subject to receiving satisfactory offers," the Canadian firm said Tuesday.

Ridley Inc., whose board is now chaired by former Agricore United CEO Brian Hayward, said Tuesday it has launched a "strategic review" to explore "potential sale alternatives" for Ridley Corp. as well as for its other shareholders.

To that end, the company said it has started contacting "potentially interested parties," some of whom have already signed confidentiality agreements under which they can review information about Ridley and its financial affairs.

Other than those confidentiality agreements, however, Ridley stressed that it hasn't made any agreements with any interested parties, nor has it received any proposals or offers to buy. The strategic review is just at its "initial stage," Ridley wrote.

The company recently halted years of uncertainty over its financial future when it agreed to pay $6 million to end its exposure to class-action lawsuits over the arrival of BSE in Canada.

Cattle producers in four provinces had filed co-ordinated suits, only one of which was granted class-action status before the settlement was announced in February. The suits had alleged negligence on Ridley's part leading to the infection of an Alberta cow with BSE, to be discovered in May 2003.

The federal government remains a defendant in those suits, which claim potentially several hundreds of millions of dollars in damages relating to cattle producers' losses from the BSE-related closure of the U.S. border to Canadian beef and cattle.

It's not yet known how the settlement cash will be paid out or to whom. Ridley has stressed that its settlement "makes no admission of liability or wrongdoing."


Also see Ridley third quarter financial report:

http://newsstore.smh.com.au/apps/previewDocument.ac?docID=GCA00840731RIC

[Kathy]

All these suits are doing, is promulgating an unproven hypothesis about the spread of BSE. Keeping the ranchers and lawyers busy, depleteing their pocket books and distracting you from the true multifactoral cause of this and other related disorders.

Thankfully, even though the AB prion institute is twiddling its nose at copper and prions (aka mineral imbalance) not everyone is so blind:

J Alzheimers Dis. 2008 May;13(4):407-19.
Amyloids: friend or foe?Hammer ND, Wang X, McGuffie BA, Chapman MR.
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-0620, USA.

Amyloidogenesis is the aggregation of soluble proteins into structurally conserved fibers. Amyloid fibers are distinguished by their resistance to proteinase K, tinctorial properties and beta-sheet-rich secondary structure. Amyloid formation is a hallmark of many human diseases including Alzheimer's, Huntington's and the prion diseases. Therefore, understanding amyloidogenesis will provide insights into the development of the****utics that target these debilitating diseases. A new class of ;functional' amyloids promises a unique glimpse at how nature has harnessed the amyloid fiber to accomplish important physiological tasks. Functional amyloids are produced by organisms spanning all aspects of cellular life. Herein we review amyloidogenesis, with special attention focused on the similarities and differences between the best characterized disease-associated amyloidogenic protein amyloid-beta and the formation of several functional amyloids. The implications of studying functional amyloidogenesis and the strategies organisms employ to limit exposure to toxic intermediates will also be discussed.
PMID: 18487849

[Kathy]

This was the abstract I should have posted, better tells the relationship between disease and metal status.

Amyloid. 2008 Jun;15(2):108-16.
Multi-elemental analysis of serum and amyloid fibrils in familial amyloid polyneuropathy patients.Susuki S, Ando Y, Sato T, Nishiyama M, Miyata M, Suico MA, Shuto T, Kai H.
Department of Molecular Medicine, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Global COE Cell Fate Regulation Research and Education Unit, Kumamoto University, 5-1 Oe-Honmachi, Kumamoto, Japan.

There is accumulating evidence of the involvement of biological metal imbalance in the progression of amyloid diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and prion diseases. However, the mineral status in patients affected with familial amyloidotic polyneuropathy (FAP) has not been investigated. It is the aim of this study to determine the metal concentrations in the serum and in the transthyretin (TTR) amyloid fibrils of FAP amyloidogenic TTR (ATTR) V30M patients. Multi-elemental analysis of 17 metals by high-resolution inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) revealed a significant decrease of the metals Fe, Cu, Zn, Cs and Ba in the serum of FAP patients (mean age 38.5 /- 8.3 years; duration of disease 4 /- 2.6 years) in comparison with that of healthy individuals (mean age 36.2 /- 9.2 years). On the other hand, these metals, except Cs, were found at high levels in the amyloid fibrils of FAP patients (mean age 55.8 /- 9.2; duration of disease 6.5 /- 1.3 years) compared with other metals. These findings firstly suggest that the mineral status could be a candidate factor, which participates in the wide spectrum of clinical pictures of FAP patients.

PMID: 18484337