Bushmeat Passed Off As Beef in Kenya

James Akedi's plate is piled with fragrant strips of nyama choma, the entree of choice in much of East Africa whose name means, quite simply, "roasted meat."

Akedi can only hope he's getting what he paid for: two pounds of government-inspected, disease-free beef. Kenyan authorities say wild animals such as zebra and wildebeest are illegally slaughtered and passed off as beef _ posing grave threats from diseases such as Ebola and anthrax linked to eating the flesh of infected animals.
"I have always been cautious when going out to buy meat," Akedi said. "But you never know."

Over the weekend, police recovered more than 450 pounds of "bushmeat" in an unrefrigerated minibus traveling from a wildlife dispersal area outside Nairobi National Park, Kenya Wildlife Service spokesman Paul Udoto said.

The driver said he was going to pass off the meat as beef at Nairobi markets, Udoto said.

Similar shipments have been entering Nairobi nearly every day for the past two months, the wildlife service said. Three people have been arrested and are charged with poaching and illegal trade in wildlife meat.

"This is a big threat to human consumption," Udoto said. "It has not been inspected by veterinary officials."

Human outbreaks of Ebola, a deadly virus that causes massive hemorrhaging, have been linked to handling carcasses and eating the flesh of primates infected with the disease. Anthrax and the hemorrhagic disease Rift Valley fever are also risks to people who are exposed to dead infected animals or eat tissue from infected animals.

The problem isn't limited to Africa, either: In southern China, authorities have cracked down on a burgeoning illegal civet cat trade to prevent an outbreak of SARS. Civet cats, mongoose-like animals, are considered a delicacy in China and are suspected of spreading severe acute respiratory syndrome to humans.

In many West and Central African countries, bushmeat _ particularly from primates and elephants _ is considered a delicacy. But in Kenya, the main reason for eating it is the lower cost. While beef sells for around $1 per pound, a pound of bush meat may cost 20 cents.

The problem of bushmeat making its way onto Kenyans' dinner plates is not new. In 2004, a conservation group analyzed the meat from 202 butchers in Nairobi, finding that 25 percent of the products surveyed were bushmeat and 19 percent a mixture of game and meat from domestic animals

source:www.washingtonpost.com