Beals receives Animal Health Award
Texas state veterinarian, Dr. Terry Beals (OKL '64) was awarded the 1999 national Animal Health Award by the USDA-APHIS during the US Animal Health Association annual meeting last October in San Diego.
While presenting the award to Dr. Beals, APHIS administrator, Dr. Craig Reed noted the Texas veterinarian's dedication and leadership in state, national, and international animal health programs.
Dr. Beals is also executive director of the Texas Animal Health Commission, a regulatory agency for livestock health. He joined the commission as a state epidemiologist in 1990 and was selected a year later to oversee it.
Under Dr. Beals' leadership, the Texas Animal Health Commission has worked for nearly a decade to conclude traditional disease programs, such as those for brucellosis in swine and tuberculosis in cattle, while preparing for the possible introduction of a foreign or emerging animal disease or pest.
Eradication of brucellosis from cattle has progressed dramatically during Dr. Beals' tenure, with Texas' infected herd count dropping from 423 in August 1991 to five as of mid-November 1999.
Dr. Beals joined with state veterinarians from three states to protect domestic livestock from an increasing number of disease-infected feeder cattle exported from Mexico to Texas in the early 1990s. They helped establish a binational committee to set standards and closely monitor the progress of a three-stage TB eradication plan in Mexico.