University of Ottawa researcher Wayne Corneil says many of the lessons of the BSE crisis that hit cattle producers and communities across the country remain unexplored.
The economic impacts of the crisis with multibillion-dollar losses and government payouts are well known and have been thoroughly analyzed.
But he wonders about the health and family impacts of the event.
“How did these families manage through those years?” he asked in a May 11 interview. “What support did they get? What supports should be in place in the event of another crisis?”
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These issues are being explored this summer by a team of researchers investigating the family and community fallout from BSE losses.
They plan focus groups with affected farm families in Lethbridge June 1, Moose Jaw June 4, Brandon June 6 and then in eastern Ontario and central Quebec in late May and mid-June. A report is expected by autumn.
Several studies looking beyond the economic fallout are underway, funded by Prionet Canada, the industry and governments. They are looking at the impact of BSE and other livestock prion diseases such as chronic wasting disease on families caught in the middle.
“While the economic impacts are often visible, the effects on the health and well-being of affected farmers and their families, as well as their coping strategies, are not well known,” said an explanation of the research projects. “Little research has been directed at the health impacts of BSE on individuals, families and communities.”
The goal, it said, is to learn lessons about what worked and what did not work, what supports were available and what were needed.
“The health of both rural communities and farmers has received relatively little attention compared to urban populations and the BSE crisis has not changed this.”
A key issue will be what strains the impact of the disease in the cattle herd put on families trying to cope and whether it changed the status of those families in the community.
Corneil said another area of research interest is whether having been hit once by an unexpected and crippling disease has made farmers and their communities feel more vulnerable to future shocks.
“Do they see themselves as particularly at risk? Has this experience changed the way they look at their circumstance and their susceptibility to another assault?”
He said researchers also will be interested in exploring how families caught in the middle of the BSE storm received their information about what was happening and what was expected of them.
Farmers interested in taking part in the focus groups can contact research co-ordinator Sarah Crowe at scrowe@uottawa.ca.
