TORONTO — Canada confirmed a case of mad cow disease on Sunday at a farm in British Columbia — the country's fifth case since May 2003, when the United States closed its border to Canadian beef.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency announced Thursday it had a suspected case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE.

In humans, meat products contaminated with BSE has been linked to more than 150 deaths, mostly in Britain, from variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, a rare and fatal nerve disease.

The 6-year-old cow was identified on a Fraser Valley farm through the national BSE surveillance program. It is the fifth case in Canada since May 2003, when the U.S. border was closed to Canadian beef after the sick cows were detected in Canada.