Austria finds second case of mad cow disease

VIENNA - A case of mad cow disease has been found in Austria, the second in the Alpine country's history, the health and agriculture ministers said.

The ministers called a snap news conference to announce the case of the deadly brain-wasting disorder, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).

"The reason for this short-notice press conference today is the confirmation of a case of BSE in an Austrian cow," Health Minister Maria Rauch-Kallat told reporters.

Mad cow disease was first identified in Britain in 1986.

Scientists say there is a strong link between humans eating tainted meat and the risk of catching the disease. More than 100 people have died so far in Europe from the human form of mad cow disease, mostly in Britain.

The disease was found during a routine test on an 11-year-old cow from a small farm of seven cattle near the German border in the western province of Vorarlberg. All seven animals were slaughtered and cremated.

Agriculture Minister Josef Proell said it was a standard safety procedure in Austria for cattle older than 24 months that die of unknown causes to be tested for BSE.

As this cow died unexpectedly in late May after showing suspicious signs including tiredness, it was tested.

How the animal became infected was not clear, said Josef Koefer, divisional head at Austrian food safety agency AGES.

"The normal route is via the feed. The other variant that I am considering is a spontaneous mutation in the prions," he said.

BSE is caused by abnormal or misfolded prion proteins in an animal's brain.

"We may never know for certain," Koefer added.

Feeding animal meal to farm animals has been banned in Austria since 1991.

The European Union tightened food safety laws after a BSE scare in the 1990s. It has banned the use of animal parts in feed and also removed high-risk material such as spinal cord, intestines and brain from the food and feed chain.

Austria's first case of BSE was found in December 2001.

Austria's Proell said this showed Austrian cattle were screened properly.

"The system works. Consumers can be assured that Austrian beef is safe," he told reporters.

"Compared with all other European countries, we are absolutely among the best," Proell said.

"Germany currently has had 356 BSE cases, Switzerland ... has had 456 BSE cases. Austria, with Luxembourg, leads Europe with the second BSE case," he added.

- REUTERS