Horses used in labs end up on French dinner tables

Police arrested 21 people in raids on the horsemeat industry across southern France on Monday on suspicion that horses used to develop medicines were sold fraudulently for food, police and industry officials said.

Marseille public prosecutor Brice Robin said about 200 horses unfit for human consumption had been given false veterinary certificates and slaughtered for meat by an organized ring, based in the southern town of Narbonne, involving cattle traders, vets and butchers.

"There is absolutely no evidence that these animals were toxic or posed a threat to public health," he told a news conference.

A spokesman for pharmaceutical company Sanofi said some of the horses had been used to incubate antibodies to manufacture serums for everything from rabies to snake bites, and while in good health were certified as unfit for human consumption. The company said the horses had been used to provide blood for the manufacture of serums against tetanus and rabies and stressed they had not been used for drugs testing.

"The horses are all micro-chipped for traceability and they do not present any danger in the event of human consumption," a spokesman said. "It is specified in their sales certificates that these horses are not to be introduced to the food chain, but that is as a precautionary measure, not because there is any danger."

The horses were sold to traders suspected of falsifying veterinary documents or using veterinarian accomplices to issue false certificates so they could be used in the food chain.

A statement from the para-military gendarmerie said about 100 officers along with inspectors from the national veterinary brigade took part in dawn raids in 11 districts.

Checks were also carried out in Spain in the region of Girona because some of the suspect meat was exported, the prosecutor said.

French Consumer Affairs Minister Benoit Hamon said the operation stemmed from stepped-up monitoring of the industry after a French meat processing firm was at the center of a Europe-wide scandal earlier this year over mislabeled frozen meals containing horsemeat instead of beef.

The scandal, which broke in January when horse DNA was found in frozen burgers sold in Irish and British supermarkets, involved traders and abattoirs from Romania to the Netherlands.

Horsemeat has slowly fallen out of favor with consumers in France although it can still be bought at specialist butchers. The head of the national horsemeat butchers' association, Eric Vigoureux, said the whole industry should not be held responsible for the behavior of a few rogue traders. Eating horsemeat is regarded as taboo in some European countries, notably Britain, but part of the diet in Belgium, France, Spain and Italy.

The latest scare involving horsemeat production in Europe comes amid debate in the U.S. over horsemeat consumption.

On Friday, an appeals court lifted an order banning horsemeat production. It followed the failure of a bid by The Humane Society of the United States lto block horse abattoirs from reopening.

After months of legal wrangling and false starts in a more than two-year battle to resume domestic horse slaughter, plants in New Mexico and Missouri were working Monday to begin processing equine for human consumption.

"They are pushing full steam ahead to be ready to go as soon as possible," said Blair Dunn, an Albuquerque attorney who represents Valley Meat Co. of Roswell and Rains Natural Meats of Gallatin, Mo.

Rains Natural Meats, he said, even had horses on site. But it was unclear if the plants would open before Christmas or wait until after the holidays.

The Humane Society said "the fight for America's horses is not over."

Wire services