The United States Agriculture Department confirmed Monday a new case of mad cow disease, which is the third such of its kind reported in the country.

A routine test last week suggested a possible case, and further tests of different types confirmed a positive result for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), said John Clifford, the agriculture department's chief veterinary officer.

He meanwhile stressed that the infected animal had not entered the human food chain.

The new case was found in a dead beef cow. Clifford said the cow, which appears to have been at least 10 years old, spent the past year at a farm in Alabama. The authorities are investigating where the cow was born and raised.

"I want to emphasize that human and animal health in the United States are protected by a system of interlocking safeguards, and that we remain very confident in the safety of US beef," Clifford said.

"This animal did not enter the human food or animal feed chains."

The United States reported its first case of BSE, or mad cow disease, in December 2003 in a Canadian-born cow in Washington state. The second case was confirmed in last June in a cow born and raised in Texas.

People who eat BSE-infected beef can develop the human version of the brain-wasting disease, which is called variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. There is currently no cure for the deadly disease.

(Xinhua News Agency March 14, 2006)