News & Perspective

(CIDRAP News) – The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report examining the results several developed nations and the European Union achieved when they consolidated oversight of food safety in a single agency, a step often advocated in the United State for solving some of the problems linked to contaminated imported and domestic food.

(CIDRAP News) – A British woman who died of a brain disease suggestive of variant Creutzfeld-Jacob disease (vCJD) had a genetic marker not seen in any previous vCJD patients, raising the possibility that her illness represented a new form of the disease that could signal a new wave of infections, according to a recent research report.

(CIDRAP News) – Health officials in the United Kingdom have found a probable fourth case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) associated with a blood transfusion from someone who unknowingly had the disease.

The case was diagnosed in a patient who received blood 9 years ago from a person who later was found to have vCJD, the UK Health Protection Agency (HPA) said in a Jan 18 statement.

(CIDRAP News) – A third case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) has been reported in a US resident, but health officials believe he contracted the disease in Saudi Arabia when he was a child.

(CIDRAP News) – A blood test detected prions in animals during the asymptomatic phase of infection with scrapie, a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE), according to a study in the Jul 7 issue of Science.

(CIDRAP News) – Current estimates of how many people could die of variant Creutzfeld-Jakob disease (vCJD) may be too low, because the disorder may have a prolonged incubation time in some people, according to a study of a related disease published in the Jun 24 issue of The Lancet.

June 12, 2006 (CIDRAP News) – More people in Britain may be at risk for contracting variant Creutzfeld-Jacob disease (vCJD) than previously thought, according to a study published in the May 20 issue of the British Medical Journal.

(CIDRAP News) – Worldwide cases of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, have declined about 50% per year over the last three years, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) announced today.