China's first laboratory for mad cow disease has been established and put into operation, the State General Administration for Quality Supervision and Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) announced.

The Beijing-based laboratory is part of the country's efforts to prevent mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).

The laboratory, set up by the Beijing Administration for Exit-Entry Inspection and Quarantine, occupies an area of over 100 square meters and is fitted with equipment and technology in accordance with traditional global practices.

"The facility here will use state-of-the-art technologies to help fend off the disease," Ma Guiping, director of the laboratory, said. Construction of the laboratory was launched in February. Ma came back from Britain last year to help set up the laboratory.

Earlier this month, the laboratory checked the brain tissue of nine cow samplings, finding no trace of the disease.

Besides checking cattle for BSE, the laboratory is also expected to help improve the country's technology in this field.

In an inspection of the laboratory, Li Changjiang, director of the State General Administration for Quality Supervision and Inspection and Quarantine, has vowed to build a first-class facility.

In addition, exit-entry quarantine authorities across the borders have strengthened quarantine procedures as the global panic over mad cow disease, foot-and-mouth disease and bird flu mounts.

Mad cow disease was first diagnosed in Britain in 1986. In response, China has banned imports of cattle and cattle products from BSE-infected countries since 1990 and stopped imports of feed made from animal carcasses in the European Union on January 1 this year.

China has not detected a single case of BSE - or its human version, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease - thus far.

However, both ordinary Chinese and the country's animal husbandry industry are quite concerned about the matter.

In February, the Ministry of Agriculture checked imported cattle and domestic cows fed on meat and bone meal from abroad and found no symptoms of BSE. The ministry set up a National BSE Test Center in 1998.

(China Daily 06/29/2001)