Mad cow outbreak confirmed in Japan

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http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20010923a1.htm

 

Mad cow outbreak confirmed in Japan

 

British government veterinarians have confirmed that a

Japanese dairy cow that was suspected of having

contracted mad cow disease has been infected with the

illness, the first case reported outside Europe,

Japanese government officials said Saturday.

 

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries

Agriculture announced the results of the tests in the

early hours of Saturday, saying the infection was

identified by neuropathologists from the Veterinary

Laboratories Agency, a British government agency.

 

Mad cow disease was first detected in Britain in 1986.

It is believed to cause the fatal human variant

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.

 

The infected cow, a 5-year-old Holstein raised at a

dairy farm in Shiroi, Chiba Prefecture, first showed

symptoms of the disease on Aug. 6 when the owners

found the animal could not stand on its own.

 

In a hurriedly arranged news conference, ministry

officials said the government has no idea how the cow

was infected but ruled out an immediate ban on the use

of meat and bone meal as feed for cows. MBM feed has

been blamed for the spread of mad cow disease in

Europe.

 

The ministry has declared domestic MBM feed to be safe

but is considering a total ban on imports.

 

After suspicions were raised on Aug. 6 about the

condition of the Shiroi cow, Japanese veterinarians

conducted four tests, three of which returned positive

results for the disease, ministry officials said.

 

The Japanese government, which announced the results

on Sept. 10, sent the test results to Britain's

Veterinary Laboratories Agency for further tests.

 

The agriculture ministry said Friday that it will

review a proposal to ban all MBM imports. The proposal

was made by experts the ministry appointed to draw up

measures to stop the possible spread of mad cow

disease in Japan.

 

Agriculture ministry officials said the ministry will

study the measure, which could put Japan at odds with

trade rules set by the World Trade Organization.

 

Under WTO rules, member countries that impose a

comprehensive import ban on MBM feed must extend the

restriction to domestically produced feed as well.

 

Earlier Friday, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries

Minister Tsutomu Takebe told a news conference that

the suspected case of mad cow disease is unlikely to

affect people and vowed to increase efforts to ease

public concerns over safety.

 

" The cow involved has not been distributed as beef so

there is no possibility that the disease will infect

people in this case, " Takebe said.

 

Meanwhile, government sources said the Health, Labor

and Welfare Ministry is considering requiring dairy

farmers to dispose of cow body parts that are most

susceptible to mad cow disease before distribution to

the market in a bid to prevent further infections.

 

Cows' brains, spinal cords and small intestines are

earmarked for disposal under the measure, because they

are considered to put humans at a high risk of

contracting the disease if consumed, the sources said.

 

The health ministry currently has no intention of

implementing the measure because only one case of mad

cow disease has been discovered in Japan, ministry

sources said.

 

According to the sources, the ministry's plan requires

meat processing sites to dispose of designated cow

organs by burning and for meat dealers and restaurant

managers to follow guidelines in accordance with

relevant laws, such as the Food Sanitation Law.

 

The ministry also plans to test 1 million cows aged 30

months or older from late October.

 

In Britain, 180,000 cows have been infected with the

disease and some 100 people have been infected with

the variant CJD via contaminated beef.

 

The health ministry is also considering improving ways

of detecting symptoms of CJD in humans, adding that

the link between mad cow disease and its human variant

cannot be ignored, the sources said.

 

There are no reports of a human contracting variant

CJD in Japan.

 

 

Beef off school menu

 

The outbreak of mad cow disease in Japan, confirmed

Saturday by British veterinary experts, has led at

least 1,765 public schools in 14 prefectures to remove

beef from their lunch menus, according to a Kyodo News

survey released Saturday.

 

Education boards in 107 cities, towns and villages in

three other prefectures are also planning to drop beef

from their school lunch menus amid rising fears of

infection after the government announced on Sept. 10

that one dairy cow in Chiba Prefecture was suspected

of having been infected.

 

The survey shows school authorities in Ibaraki have

been most active in changing their menus, reporting

that the measure had been taken at 421 elementary

schools and 167 junior high schools.

 

Tokyo came next, with 338 elementary schools and 153

junior high schools, followed by Tokushima with 100

elementary schools and 32 junior high schools.

 

In Yamanashi, local education boards have reported

that beef has been removed from the menus in all but

one of the 108 public elementary and junior high

schools in seven cities.

 

Substitutions by the municipal education board in

Kainan, Wakayama Prefecture include jelly instead of

boiled sausages, pork for beef in " oden " stews and

noodles in broth instead of spaghetti with meat sauce.

 

The education board in Itami, Hyogo Prefecture, said

it had replaced beef with pork in a curry noodle dish

and so far had experienced no difficulty in finding

substitutes.

 

According to the Kyodo poll, the reasons cited for

dropping beef include, in the case of one education

board in Ibaraki, " not using anything that is in

doubt, " and, in the words of an education board in

Shizuoka Prefecture, " minimizing any danger. "

 

However, many local education boards in southern Japan

-- notably those in Kyushu and Okinawa -- say they are

not particularly concerned about eating beef.

 

" The agriculture ministry has declared beef and dairy

goods are safe, " the Hiroshima municipal education

board stated.

 

Elsewhere, some education boards say they have yet to

consider the situation, while others declined to

answer the Kyodo survey, citing fear of

" misunderstanding " or overreaction to the mad cow

scare.

 

The Japan Times: Sept. 23, 2001

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