pulling tins of Brazilian corned beef from their shelves despite a mad cow disease scare sweeping North America.

Last week Canada, the United States and Mexico all banned the import of a number of Brazilian beef products after Brazil failed to comply with Canada's request for information regarding its beef.

Concern over Brazilian beef -- the country has the world's largest cattle herd -- arose because Brazil imported live animals from Europe up until 1999 when mad cow disease was rampant in the UK and popping up around the continent.

While the United States has merely banned new imports of the Brazilian products, a spokesman from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) confirmed yesterday that Canadian stores must pull all banned Brazilian beef products from their shelves immediately. "It's mandatory,'' said Jim Hunter of CFIA.

It is understood that there are three brands of corned beef being sold locally which contain Brazilian beef -- Libby's, Hormel and Grace.

And island grocers said yesterday that they were sufficiently confident that the products are safe to keep them on the shelves despite the new ban.

Marketplace -- the island's largest chain of grocery stores -- told the Royal Gazette that they will leave stock in place. "We take the lead from the importer,'' said vice president Scott Carswell. "Beyond that we don't have any comment.'' Supermart president Tredick Gorham said his stores would keep selling the corned beef unless the Health Department or the supplier came out and said it is unsafe. "The thing is we rely on the Health Department, and they don't have a position on it,'' he said.

The Royal Gazette attempted to contact Minister of Health and Family Services Nelson Bascome for the Ministry's position on the corned beef yesterday but had not received a reply by press time.

"We're going to sell until we have an official health directive,'' continued Mr. Gorham.

He said that given that the US had not seen fit to pull the products from shelves and that the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) was the toughest in the world, Supermarts will continue to sell until supplies run out.

"This is definitely not a financial issue,'' he said. "We have a couple of cases, it's not a matter that we're going to lose money. The issue is we're not sure whether it's a legitimate claim or if it's just hysteria.'' Smaller grocers said that they would be looking to bigger stores to see whether they pulled supplies. "I do carry it,'' said Joe DaCosta, the manager of Happy Valley Mini Mart. "I don't have much stock left. I'm basically waiting for the big supermarkets to see what they're doing.'' And he pointed out that as the wholesaler -- Butterfield and Vallis -- has assured that current supplies predate the ban. "It's a safe product as far as I'm concerned.'' Lindo's Family Foods' manager William Moniz expressed similar confidence.

"The Libby's corned beef on our shelves was brought in six months ago,'' he said. "When Butterfield and Vallis tell us to take it off, we'll take it off or if the Health Department tells us to take it off. I see it at this point in time to be quite okay to sell it.'' Wholesalers Butterfield and Vallis -- which brings in Libby's corned beef -- took the lead in explaining the ramifications of the ban to the island.

General manager Edward Sousa said that the US ban will prevent any additional supplies from being brought into the island, but supplies currently on island were as safe as they had been for decades.

A number of grocers said that should the public ask for the corned beef to be removed from shelves, they would be. "We're here to serve,'' said Mr. Gorham.

The threat to humans from mad cow disease -- or Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) -- is due to new variant Creutzfeld-Jakob Disease (nvCJD) which is believed to arise from eating BSE infected beef.

The often fatal, degenerative disease has been described as a "brain wasting disease'' and over 90 cases have been reported to date, primarily in the UK.

Between 1986 and the end of last year, 180,000 cases of BSE had been confirmed in the UK alone with smaller numbers in other parts of Europe.

Last week, Bermuda followed a US decision to ban blood donations from people who had spent a cumulative six months in any part of Europe between 1980 and 1996 as a protective measure against nvCJD.

On sale: Two brands of corned beef on sale in stores yesterday.