Whatever happened with Greg Niewendorp’s resistance to the Michigan Department of Agriculture’s effort to test his 160 cows for bovine tuberculosis?

It turns out that the parties are pretty much where they were three months ago, when Niewendorp publicly challenged the MDA to press charges against him for refusing to go along with the agency’s bovine TB test and, in the process, with the state’s first-in-the-nation requirement that all cattle be registered for the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). Niewendorp is still resisting, and the MDA says his farm remains under quarantine.

But interestingly, the standoff provides insights into the much ballyhooed case of the man who flew to Europe and back with a case of extensively drug resistant tuberculosis, known as XDR TB. The media and federal government have spent the last couple days playing up the dangers of a possible mass outbreak of a form of an ancient disease we can’t counter with antibiotics.

I called the MDA to learn about the agency’s response to Niewendorp, and was told by Bridget Patrick, a communications coordinator, that while the agency won’t comment on the specifics of a particular farm or farmer, the Niewendorp situation is “a stalemate.” In other words, the MDA still considers his farm to be under quarantine and to stay that way indefinitely.

In justifying the MDA’s requirement for testing animals in the northern part of Michigan’s lower peninsula for bovine TB, and monitoring all cattle electronically, she suggests that the situation is comparable to the current human TB case. “Ten years ago, it took us a minimum of six to eight weeks and as much as two years to track down all animals exposed to TB,” she said. Today, thanks to electronic records, “We find animals that have been infected within hours…The problem with not moving quickly is this disease can infect other (cattle) quickly…Bovine TB is a respiratory disease that is highly infectious—it can infect humans through raw milk and people who process the animals…The situation is comparable to what is happening now with TB” in the American traveler.

She suggested that Niewendorp was being something less than a good citizen for refusing to go along with the MDA’s TB testing and record-keeping program. “We have this covenant with our farmers…Everyone wants to get through this disease. It’s a joint effort with the producers.”

Niewendorp, for his part, remains defiant. He challenges the MDA to come after him, accusing the agency of “fraud” in suggesting to him last February that he was potentially at risk for a year in jail and a $50,000 fine for refusing to comply with the state, and then doing nothing. “You tell them to bring it on and they don’t bring it on, it’s fraud.”

He even questions whether his farm really is under quarantine. “I never signed their papers, so I don’t think I am.” In any event, he’s not been shipping animals into or out of his farm.

He scoffs at the MDA’s suggestion that he’s being a bad citizen for failing to help contain a contagious disease. “Bovine TB is not highly contagious. People inside the MDA have told me that.” Most of the animals that test positive for bovine TB actually have been exposed to avian TB, he says, which is much less of a problem.

He senses that the uproar over human TB is comparable to what’s happening in Michigan. He argues that TB, whether in animals or humans, develops as a result of “stress”—malnutrition, bad living conditions, and poor immunity.

There seems to be debate in the scientific community about just how dangerous the human TB case really is, with scientists at both extremes, according to a New York Times article.

Somehow, the media and government upset have the feel of the hysteria that comes up periodically about raw milk: Another case of a “problem” our public officials thought was “solved” that just won’t go away.