New case of BSE in Canada
15/03/2010
The Canadian Beef Export Federation has said that it will be 2016 before the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) can upgrade the country’s risk status for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).
A seventeenth case of the disease was confirmed in a cow in mid-March. The animal was born in February 2004, making it Canada's latest-born case of BSE. A country cannot apply to upgrade its status sooner than 11 years after the latest-born case of BSE. The process then takes about one year.
Canada can continue to ship beef as long as it meets conditions such as disease surveillance.
The 2003 discovery of the first case of mad cow disease on a Canadian farm caused many countries to halt imports of Canadian beef. Most markets have since reopened, but the cattle industry remains in a slump due to other factors such as a strong Canadian dollar, Reuters reported.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency tightened feed rules in 2007 to help eliminate the disease nationally within a decade, although the agency cautioned it still expected to discover the occasional new case.
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