News & Perspective

Editor's note: This story was updated Nov 15 to include additional information from Food and Drug Administration officials.

(CIDRAP News) – Federal health officials have announced plans to expand research on whether chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk poses a threat to humans and other species.

(CIDRAP News) – A Saskatchewan man who died earlier this summer was Canada's first victim of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), but he probably acquired the disease in the United Kingdom, Canadian health officials announced yesterday.

(CIDRAP News) – The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced this week that it will begin using laboratory testing to ensure that beef products from mechanical "advanced meat recovery" (AMR) systems are free of spinal cord tissue.

(CIDRAP News) – A British woman living in Florida has what appears to be the first case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) reported in a US resident, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Note: This story was updated March 1, 2002, to include additional information about recent federal actions to prevent mad cow disease.