Source: Mainichi Daily News
The on again, off again beef-trading relationship between Japan and the U.S./Canada is about to hit the "off again" stage again.
A 20-month-old steer may have tested positive for mad cow disease, and this may be one of the youngest to date.
It looks like rough times ahead for the U.S. and Canadian beef-exporting trades.
A 20-month-old steer in northeastern Japan may have had mad cow disease, and if the case is confirmed it could affect Japan's imports of U.S. and Canadian beef, officials said Monday.
A young Holstein killed for meat last week in Fukushima Prefecture, was found to have tested positive for the brain-wasting disease, according to Toshitaka Higashira of the Agricultural Ministry.
If confirmed, it would be one of the youngest cows to test positive for mad cow -- the common name for bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE -- in the world. The youngest as of 2005 was a 20-month-old cow found with the disease in Britain in 1992, according to Japan's Food Safety Commission.
Vice Agriculture Minister Mamoru Ishihara told reporters that, if confirmed, the case "would be of a nature that would affect import restrictions on beef from the U.S. and Canada."
Japan in December eased a two-year-old ban on U.S. beef to allow imports from cows aged 20 months or younger which did not contain body parts thought at risk of the disease. It reinstated that ban a month later after a shipment of U.S. veal was found to contain prohibited bones.
Tags: [mad cow disease], [another case of mad cow disease spotted in Japan], [Japan], [United States and Canadian beef exporting trades may be affected], [20-month-old steer the youngest yet]
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