January 21, 2004

 

 

Japan Say US, Canadian Beef Not Yet 100% Safe

 

A Japanese government team returning from a mission to investigate the United States' first confirmed case of mad cow disease warned Monday that U.S. and Canadian cows were still vulnerable to an outbreak of the illness.

 

Japan banned imports from the United States in December after the first U.S. case of mad cow disease was discovered. Tokyo banned Canadian beef seven months earlier after a case of the illness - bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE - was found there.

 

Both Washington and Ottawa are pressing Japan to drop the bans, arguing that their beef products are safe, but the findings of the 11-day Japanese mission to the United States and Canada advised caution.

 

"It cannot be guaranteed that there will not be a recurrence of BSE in the United States," the five-member team said in its report, citing the close links between the two countries' beef industries.

 

The infected cow discovered in Washington state was imported from Canada. 

 

Before the ban, Japan was the top importer of U.S. beef, snapping up some US$1 billion worth of American beef and beef products a year. It also imported about Y5.8 billion worth of Canadian beef in 2002 before halting trade last May.

 

The sharp drop in beef supplies has sent the price of both domestic and imported beef soaring in Japan. The Agriculture Ministry said Monday that retail prices reached a record high last week since it began monitoring such data in August.

 

Japan, which tests all of the 1.3 million cattle it slaughters every year for the disease, is pressing beef-exporting nations to adopt similar safeguards.

 

While acknowledging safety measures implemented by the United States and Canada, the team concluded that they "do not rule out the possibility of crossover contamination."

 

The report said U.S. and Canadian officials were planning to provide additional details about questions unanswered during the mission. Washington is also expected to dispatch a negotiating team to Japan this week.

 

Mad cow disease is believed to spread by recycling meat and bones from infected animals back into cattle feed. The disease is thought to cause the fatal variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans who eat the infected beef. CJD kills its carrier by tearing holes in brain tissue.