Japan's Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry on Monday confirmed that a five-year-and-four-month-old female cow, which died last week in northern Japan, has tested positive for mad cow disease. The discovery brings to 30 the number of confirmed bovine spongiform encephalopathy cases in Japan.

Reports say the cow was born in June 2001 before the implementation of a ban on meat-and-bone meal which is suspected of being the cause of the brain-wasting disease. The cow was traced on a farm in Chitose, Hokkaido prefecture, it was said.

The dreaded disease was first discovered in Britain in 1986 and soon spread to other countries in Europe, Asia and North America.

It can be transferred to humans by eating beef infected with BSE.

Japanese health authorities diagnosed the country's first mad cow case in September 2001. Since then, the government introduced measures to screen every cow slaughtered for human consumption.