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Wednesday and £4,000,000 of relief
Well this is probably one of the biggest farces I've seen in a long while.
For posterity the text of that news story is below:
I just don't know how to feel right now. Let me try and put things into perspective for you, the British 24-hour ration pack (approved by NATO, as mentioned before) are around £8-£10 a throw and we've sent 400,000. That means that if those packs get burned the American goverment will have thrown away £3.2m-£4m worth of aid that every single British citizen has paid for.
The fact that this aid is being denied to those who need it is pretty damn stupid, and I'll hope that those of you who are American will excuse the British for feeling a little miffed that the aid we've given you might be thrown away.
I hope the US FDA sees sense, I really do. This isn't good for American/British relations. :/
For posterity the text of that news story is below:
19 September 2005 - Daily Mirror
EXCLUSIVE: UP IN FLAMES
Tons of British aid donated to help Hurricane Katrina victims to be BURNED by Americans
From Ryan Parry, US Correspondent in New York
HUNDREDS of tons of British food aid shipped to America for starving Hurricane Katrina survivors is to be burned. US red tape is stopping it from reaching hungry evacuees.
Instead tons of the badly needed Nato ration packs, the same as those eaten by British troops in Iraq, has been condemned as unfit for human consumption.
And unless the bureaucratic mess is cleared up soon it could be sent for incineration.
One British aid worker last night called the move "sickening senselessness" and said furious colleagues were "spitting blood".
The food, which cost British taxpayers millions, is sitting idle in a huge warehouse after the Food and Drug Agency recalled it when it had already left to be distributed.
Scores of lorries headed back to a warehouse in Little Rock, Arkansas, to dump it at an FDA incineration plant.
The Ministry of Defence in London said last night that 400,000 operational ration packs had been shipped to the US. But officials blamed the US Department of Agriculture, which impounded the shipment under regulations relating to the import and export of meat.
The aid worker, who would not be named, said: "This is the most appalling act of sickening senselessness while people starve.
"The FDA has recalled aid from Britain because it has been condemned as unfit for human consumption, despite the fact that these are Nato approved rations of exactly the same type fed to British soldiers in Iraq.
"Under Nato, American soldiers are also entitled to eat such rations, yet the starving of the American South will see them go up in smoke because of FDA red tape madness."
The worker added: "There will be a cloud of smoke above Little Rock soon - of burned food, of anger and of shame that the world's richest nation couldn't organise a p**s up in a brewery and lets Americans starve while they arrogantly observe petty regulations.
"Everyone is revolted by the chaotic shambles the US is making of this crisis. Guys from Unicef are walking around spitting blood.
"This is utter madness. People have worked their socks off to get food into the region.
"It is perfectly good Nato approved food of the type British servicemen have. Yet the FDA are saying that because there is a meat content and it has come from Britain it must be destroyed.
"If they are trying to argue there is a BSE reason then that is ludicrously out of date. There is more BSE in the States than there ever was in Britain and UK meat has been safe for years."
The Ministry of Defence said: "We understand there was a glitch and these packs have been impounded by the US Department of Agriculture under regulations relating to the import and export of meat.
"The situation is changing all the time and at our last meeting on Friday we were told progress was being made in relation to the release of these packs. The Americans certainly haven't indicated to us that there are any more problems and they haven't asked us to take them back."
Food from Spain and Italy is also being held because it fails to meet US standards and has been judged unfit for human consumption. And Israeli relief agencies are furious that thousands of gallons of pear juice are to be destroyed because it has been judged unfit.
The FDA said: "We did inspect some MREs (meals ready to eat) on September 13. They are the only MREs we looked at. There were 70 huge pallets of vegetarian MREs. "They were from a foreign nation. We inspected them and then released them for distribution."
I just don't know how to feel right now. Let me try and put things into perspective for you, the British 24-hour ration pack (approved by NATO, as mentioned before) are around £8-£10 a throw and we've sent 400,000. That means that if those packs get burned the American goverment will have thrown away £3.2m-£4m worth of aid that every single British citizen has paid for.
The fact that this aid is being denied to those who need it is pretty damn stupid, and I'll hope that those of you who are American will excuse the British for feeling a little miffed that the aid we've given you might be thrown away.
I hope the US FDA sees sense, I really do. This isn't good for American/British relations. :/
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Besides, Compo packs are nice...o.O so nice in fact that US personal will always try to swap their MREs for ours XD.
To which the reply is normally "Sod off"
I still get bits an pieces from them when my dad goes of of excersise or what not.
Heh, I'm going to have to buy some now :)
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*nods* And the sole fact that they come with Kendel Mintcakes...makes them own even more :D lol
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American culture seems to have this almost slavish devotion to following writern rules even though they may be illogical or impractical.
Bill Bryson made a very good example of this some years ago when he was trying to check in for an internal US flight. They asked him for some sort of ID. so he produced his old divers licence which they refused to take because it was no longer valid, nerv mind that it still baring his name, photo and other details. he then produced a copy of his latest book which had his name in big letters on it and his photo printed on the back; but because niether an expired drivers licence or the book was a list of approved forms of ID they wouldn't let him on. never mind that both actually did the job that the ID check was for, it didn't fit with what was writern.
every time i'm in the states it's omethign that baffles me (actually many things baffle me about the states; years of travel only seem to enhance that wonderful feeling of culture-shock).
I suppose it's the same mindset that gave rise to the compensation culture, sueing for the stupidest things totaly ignoring commonsense (abit like the British insistance on playing cricket, but more profitable).
but when people let burocracy get in the way stuff like this,... it's just sickening,...
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Of course, I kinda wonder why these rations were sent in the first place - it's not as if the USA are a starving third-world country, so why should we pay for their disaster relief with our tax money [1] -, but they could at least refuse them *before* they're sent, or, if they already are sent, *send them back* instead of destroying them. This just arrogant and idiotic.
1. Helping out is always a good thing, of course, but in the case of one of the richest nations in the world, I think it should be left up to the individual whether they want to donate or not. It's always possible to give money to the Red Cross or similar institutions.
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"We don't NEED your fucking help! WESAVEDYOURASSESINTHEWAR!"
Mmmm... Nationalism.
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Those ration packs look yummy, too. What a waste.
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