Hundreds more cattle found shipped after being fed tainted straw+

TOKYO, Japan, July 30 Kyodo -
Hundreds of more beef cattle were confirmed Saturday to have been shipped after being fed rice straw contaminated with radioactive cesium, with 290 from Fukushima Prefecture and 103 from Miyagi Prefecture, local officials said.
Iwate Prefecture separately said cesium above the government-set limit of 500 becquerels per kilogram had been found in the meat of a sixth animal. A meat sample from the animal measured 655 becquerels, and other meat from that animal is believed to have been consumed after it was shipped last month from a local farm to Tokyo.
The cattle are believed to have become contaminated with radioactive cesium by being fed rice straw stored outdoors in the weeks after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant spewed out radioactive material following a series of explosions after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
The Fukushima prefectural government said the number of cattle suspected to be radioactively contaminated and shipped to markets from the prefecture now stood at 872.
The 290 newly suspected cattle were shipped from Fukushima, where the crippled nuclear plant is located, to slaughterhouses in Tokyo, Saitama and Kanagawa prefectures, and Fukushima authorities are asking those prefectures to trace where the meat was later distributed.
Earlier this month the national government ordered Fukushima Prefecture to stop shipping any more beef cattle to market, and authorities are preparing to slaughter about 700 local cattle by the end of August and to test meat from all for radioactive contamination.
In Miyagi, which neighbors Fukushima, the local government said that the 103 additional cattle bring the local tally of possibly contaminated cattle to 1,134, and animals were shipped to Tokyo, Iwate, Miyagi, Chiba, Yamagata, Niigata prefectures.
But it said none of 17 cattle tested Friday and Saturday showed cesium exceeding the state limit.