Canada - Mad Cow maybe from USA
IN ITS FINAL REPORT, made public Thursday, on the case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, detected May 20 in Alberta, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency raised the possibility the disease arrived in Canada in a large 1998 shipment of pregnant U.S. cows.
The 25,000 animals were born before a ban imposed a year earlier on cattle feed containing animal protein from cows and other ruminants. Eating infected tissue is considered the most likely way that BSE is spread among cattle.
According to the report, DNA testing is underway to try to learn if the single infected animal in Alberta, known as the index case, had any links to the cows imported in 1998.
"Canada cannot, to date, exclude the possibility that the index case itself derived through this huge, unique importation," the report said.
A team of international experts that assessed Canada's investigation of the mad cow case reached no conclusion on the origin of the illness in its report, issued last week. The panel of experts had access to the final CFIA report.
Proving the BSE infection originated in the United States would create more confusion than clarity. While Canada could say the problem originated elsewhere, rather than within its industry, the integration of the U.S. and Canadian industries would raise questions about possible BSE in both countries.
The United States and other countries have closed their borders to Canadian beef imports since the lone BSE case was announced May 20, costing the Canadian industry millions of dollars a day.
Canadian officials said Thursday that tracking the cows from the 1998 shipment would be almost impossible, due in part because the Canadian Cattle Identification Program started after the animals arrived.
"The trail is cold. It would probably be close to impossible to find the exact origin of all these animals," said Claude Lavigne of the CFIA. "They've lost identification on the way."
The CFIA report says more than 70 percent of the cattle in the 1998 shipment were Black Angus, the same breed as the northern Alberta cow that later developed mad cow disease.
Canada - vacii nebune poate din SUA - Canada - Mad Cow maybe from USA - articole medicale engleza - startsanatate