Vet Found Dead After Mad Cow Failure
Tue May 14, 9:26 AM ET

TOKYO (Reuters) - A Japanese veterinarian who failed to diagnose mad cow disease in a sick dairy cow has apparently committed suicide, health officials said on Tuesday, a day after Japan confirmed its fourth case of the brain-wasting disease.

The 29-year-old woman, who worked at a public health center near the site of the latest outbreak on Japan's northern island of Hokkaido, was found dead at her home on Monday, officials at the center said. Police were investigating, media reports said.

The woman had left a note apologizing for failing to detect the disease in the six-year-old Holstein cow, the officials said.

"I'm so sorry for my unforgivable fault as a veterinarian," Mitsuaki Kawakami, head of Kushiro public health center, quoted the note as saying.

Japan's latest case of mad cow disease, formally known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (news - web sites) (BSE (news - web sites)), comes just weeks before thousands of visitors are expected to arrive for soccer's World Cup finals, being co-hosted with South Korea (news - web sites).

BSE has been linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (news - web sites), which has killed about 100 people in Europe but none in Japan.

Domestic media said the veterinarian had misdiagnosed the cow as suffering from neuroparalysis in one of its legs.

Difficulty standing is one symptom of BSE.

Only after it was slaughtered for processing into beef did tests come up positive for the disease.

Experts said the veterinarian's death comes as a tragic reminder of the difficulty of diagnosing BSE in living animals.

"There were no mistakes in her work," Kawakami said.

"I don't think anyone can confirm BSE in a living animal with the current level of Japanese testing.

"It's extremely regrettable ... She was earnest in her job. She was a person with a strong sense of responsibility."

The first outbreak of BSE last September sent shock waves through Japan's food sector, turning people from beef and hammering earnings of restaurants and meat companies.

Since October, Japan has tested all cattle slaughtered for processing into beef for BSE.