BSE News
Limited numbers of cases of BSE continue to appear in Europe, with Austria, Finland, Italy and Slovakia reporting further cases in the last week.
In Italy, tests have confirmed the presence of BSE in a five-year-old cow from Trento, raising the total number of cases of in the country to 43, according to the health ministry. Italy has tested 409,000 animals since the start of the year.
The Slovakian agriculture ministry said that a fifth cow in the country has tested positive for the disease. The six-year-old cow came from the Dolne Drzkovce farm in the Trencin region. Slovakia reported four cases of BSE since September, as a result of which 118 cattle have been put down.
Austria’s first BSE case was found in a 70-month-old cow in the northern part of the Lower Austrian region. Health minister Herbert Haupt announced the news during a press conference. The Austrian government decided not to reveal the location of the infected animal, but said that if confirmed all animals from the farm would be destroyed. The Austrian agriculture minister Wilhelm Molterer asked the public not to panic, but the case is widely expected to seriously affect beef sales around Christmas.
Russia has banned imports of live cattle and restricted imports of meat products from Finland and Austria over fears of mad cow disease, the farm ministry said on December 13. Russia had earlier banned beef imports from Britain, Portugal, Switzerland and some regions of France and Ireland for fear of BSE. It has also banned imports of live cattle and meat containing bone from several European Union countries and Japan. Japan is destroying 12,626 tonnes of beef after third BSE case in the country. The suspected fourth case proved to be negative
