Day 114 - 04 Apr 95 - Page 61


     
     1        going on around me.
     2
     3   Q.   When you are on operating table (and I hope you never are)
     4        and you are under a general anaesthetic you continue to
     5        breathe, do you not, but you are insensible, are you not?
     6        A.  It does happen, particularly with women with caesarean
     7        operations when you have to use a very light anaesthetic,
     8        that they do report that they do detect a pain; although
     9        they are apparently out they still detect pain.  So I would
    10        not be too sure about any assurances you give me there.
    11        I would prefer to have good anaesthetist at hand.
    12
    13   Q.   I think we would all agree about that, Dr. Long, but leave
    14        humans on the operating table and take a cow that is lying
    15        on the ground about to be tipped out of the stunning pen
    16        having been shot with a captive bolt pistol; it is still
    17        breathing but, to all intents and purposes, it is
    18        insensible.  How long do you think it might take that
    19        animal to recover consciousness, assuming your possibility
    20        that that is practically speaking a possibility?
    21        A.  I think it would possibly ensue within two, three
    22        minutes, but it might ensue over five minutes.
    23
    24   Q.   Well then, why your 30 seconds, is really my question?
    25        A.  Because I believe in these matters in giving a great
    26        deal of benefit to the doubt.  I think these could be very
    27        cruel processes.  I think one should operate
    28        expeditiously.  If you go to longer times there is the
    29        danger that the animal will be felled and for some reason
    30        there is a stoppage in the line or something it is left
    31        there for longer, and it may return to some sort of
    32        consciousness.  It may still be unable to get up.  It may
    33        feel very sick and groggy, but it will suffer pain.
    34
    35   Q.   If it should, as it were, recover consciousness in that way
    36        that it becomes sensible to pain, then no doubt having been
    37        shot in the head with a captive bolt pistol it would feel
    38        whatever animals do feel about that kind of condition,
    39        would it not?
    40        A.  It would have a hefty headache I should think.
    41
    42   Q.   And shortly after that it would have its lower chest stuck
    43        while it was conscious, would it not?
    44        A.  I think the comparison we make is with a patient who
    45        has come round from an epileptic seizure.
    46
    47   Q.   How much testing have you done for antibiotic or other
    48        residues in animal meat for human consumption?
    49        A.  I have not done any directly.  I had training as an
    50        organic chemist and, therefore, I was able to examine the 
    51        results of the tests that the Ministry of Agriculture put 
    52        out.  I was able to examine them critically.  I was able, 
    53        particularly, to examine the new procedures which the
    54        Ministry is adopting in controlling tests that are done in
    55        various laboratories.
    56
    57   Q.   How much science do you think one needs to understand
    58        questions of veterinary treatment of animals?
    59        A.  What we would have to think about -- when you say
    60        "veterinary treatment", for infectious diseases?

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