variant Creutzfeldt Jakob disease (vCJD) News and Research

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India could be the source of Mad Cow disease

According to British scientists, Mad Cow disease may have originated from animal feed contaminated with human remains washed ashore after being floated down river in Indian funerals.

5 Sep 2005

New method can detect 'mad cow' proteins in blood

Researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (UTMB) have found a way to detect the malformed proteins in blood that cause "mad cow disease".

29 Aug 2005

New surgical cleaning process reduces risk of vCJD

Scientists say a new cleaning process will reduce the risk of hospital transmission of the human form of mad cow disease.

4 Aug 2005

Three cases of mad cow disease in UK from donated blood

Health officials in the UK are warning blood donors that three patients developed the human form of mad cow disease after receiving blood from a possible one hundred people, some of whom are suspected of carrying the deadly agent.

21 Jul 2005

First confirmed case of Mad Cow disease in Holland

The first known case of the human form of "mad cow disease" - known as variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD), has been diagnosed in the Netherlands.

22 Apr 2005

Researchers and drug giant team up to find cure for CJD

The Medical Research Council's Prion Unit, based at University College London, a leading British research group, is joining forces with drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) to develop a cure for the disease Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD).

12 Apr 2005

Research into how prions act in the brain could hold the key to defeating diseases

Scientists at the University of Southampton are continuing their pioneering research into diseases such as Creutzfeld-Jakob Disease (CJD) and related conditions caused by tiny particles known as prions, thanks to a £300,000 grant from the Medical Research Council.

1 Mar 2005

Likelihood of a large number of future cases of vCJD remains small

According to research published today in Journal of the Royal Society Interface, the team believe there will be around 70 future cases of vCJD arising from the consumption of BSE-infected beef. At most this could rise to a total of around 600 deaths, although the researchers feel this is unlikely.

12 Jan 2005

Ireland is reporting its first case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease

The man in his early 20's was admitted to hospital as a suspected case 4 weeks ago. Recent tests on the patient's tonsils have detected the presence of the protein which causes vCJD.

11 Nov 2004

Mad cow disease prions can be removed from blood

New research results released today confirm that infectious variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) prions that cause the human form of "mad cow disease" can be removed from blood.

From Pall Corporation 3 Nov 2004

Large-scale screening programme of tonsil tissue is the only way of identifying the true incidence of vCJD infection

A study in this week’s issue of THE LANCET describes how two different types of analysis used in conjunction on samples of tonsil tissue is the ‘gold standard’ method for confirming clinical variant CJD

30 Sep 2004

Steps to minimise the risk of onward transmission of vCJD

Selected groups of patients are this week being notified about the results of a risk assessment exercise for blood plasma products.

22 Sep 2004

One of Australia's largest hospitals has suspected case of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease

The Royal Melbourne Hospital, one of Australia's largest hospitals, has contacted 1056 patients today after a man died of a suspected case of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease.

13 Sep 2004

John Reid has announced further developments concerning variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease

He told MPs in a written ministerial statement that an exercise has begun to notify some recipients of blood products about the results of a risk assessment exercise carried out by the Health Protection Agency.

10 Sep 2004

Chiron acquires a variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease research company

Chiron Corporation has announced that it had acquired Prion Solutions Inc., a privately held company based in La Jolla, Calif., focused on research into variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) and other prion-related diseases. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

1 Sep 2004

Susceptibility to vCJD was predicted to increase during childhood, peak during adolescence and decrease sharply afterwards

That young people tend to eat more beef products is not enough to explain the strikingly high proportion of new-variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease cases among children and adolescents. An article published this week in BMC Infectious Diseases, shows that young people must also be more susceptible to vCJD infection because of their age.

9 Aug 2004

Second case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease infection that was probably caused by blood transfusion

Research reported in The Lancet this week details the second case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) infection that was probably caused by blood transfusion. The rogue prion responsible for vCJD was identified at postmortem five years after an elderly person received a blood transfusion from a donor who later developed vCJD.

5 Aug 2004

New precautionary measures against the possible risk of transmission of variant Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease

The UK Department of Health (DOH) has said today that recipients of blood transfusions are to be excluded from donating blood in the future as a further precautionary measure against the possible risk of transmission of variant Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease (vCJD), Health Secretary John Reid announced today.

23 Jul 2004

300,000 mad French cows since the 1980's

According to new French research reported in le figaro more than 300,000 French cows would have been infected by the agent BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy ) since the 1980's.

3 Jul 2004

Study indicates the number of people in the UK who could be incubating vCJD

The Journal of Pathology recently published a paper entitled Prevalence of lymphoreticular prion protein accumulation in UK tissue samples. The study looked at 12,674 stored appendix and tonsil samples, and found that 3 of them showed evidence of the prion protein associated with variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD).

25 May 2004