US beef industry on tenterhooks as mad cow test awaited

WASHINGTON, Nov 22 (AFP) - The multi-billion-dollar US beef industry kept holding its breath nervously on Monday as government veterinarians continued to test the tissue from an unidentified cow to see if it was harboring mad cow disease.
Authorities announced last Thursday that a field test for the disease, known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), had registered positive, but that further tests were required to produce a definitive result.
The authorities have not revealed where the suspect animal was discovered, and the beef industry is on tenterhooks awaiting the test results.
"Test results for the BSE inconclusive are not complete. There will be no announcements made tonight," Alisa Harrison, a spokeswoman for the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), said in a brief statement Monday.
She said the USDA will release the results as soon as the National Veterinary Services Laboratory completes the testing process.
The only confirmed US mad cow case was found in the northwestern United States on December 23. The cow was from Canada, but some 30 countries banned imports of US beef as a precaution.

11/23/2004 00:36 GMT - AFP