Mad Cow Disease in Jacksonville – Part 2

Yesterday, I wrote about a case of Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease (CJD) in Jacksonville, Fla. The initial report said the patient, a 23-year old woman, did not acquire it by eating tainted meat.

Today, I call that assertion into serious question. Intrigued that CJD could be caught in some other way than through eating meat from a cow with Mad Cow Disease, I did some online research.

It is true Mad Cow Disease is not the only way to get CJD. There are two different types of CJD. One is called “classic,” in which there is a spontaneous mutation of normal brain protein into an abnormal protein” that then “leads to the production of more abnormal protein.” The other form of CJD is called Variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease or “vCJD.” This comes from “ingesting meat infected with the prion that causes mad cow disease (BSE).” The meat has to be contaminated by nervous system tissue to cause vCJD.

Here’s the kicker. “Most of the cases of classic CJD have been diagnosed in people between the ages of 55 and 75” because it takes “between 10 to 40 years” to become symptomatic after the protein mutates. Again, “Classic CJD almost always occurs in people over 50 years old. Once someone gets classic CJD, they may live for 6 to 12 months.”

Variant CJD, on the other hand, is a disease of young people. The average age of onset is 29 years of age. The symptoms of vCJD are slightly different and patients live slightly longer than those with classic CJD. “There have been 153 cases of vCJD reported in the world since the first case was identified in 1995.” It took about ten years for the first cases of vCJD to be reported after Mad Cow Disease infected British cattle.

The Jacksonville patient is too young to have classic CJD if my sources are correct. If she has Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease, then it is the vCJD.

The question, then, becomes where or how did she eat meat tainted with Mad Cow Disease? Did she travel to Britain during the 1990s and eat British meat before Mad Cow Disease was under control there? Or, was she exposed to Canadian beef when Mad Cow Disease was discovered there? Or, did she eat beef in her school lunch program that came from downer cattle that had Mad Cow Disease? I simply do not know, but I call for thorough investigation.

Source: CDC Fact Sheets, State of Massachusetts Dept. of Public Health http://www.mass.gov/dph/cdc/factsheets/madcow.htm

Is Mad Cow Disease in Jacksonville?

According to a report aired by Channel 47 on Friday, April 18, 2008, a woman has been diagnosed with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD). She has been a patient at Shands Hospital Jacksonville, Fla. since December. Doctors here say they are 99.9% sure she has CJD. The report said she did not acquire it by eating tainted meat infected with Mad Cow Disease. This is such a sad story.

Channel 47 emphasized a family scrabble involved with the case. It was reminiscent of the Terry Schiavo case. Here, the patient’s parents are in opposition to the woman’s long-time boyfriend, who is her healthcare surrogate. The parents want to transfer her to a third hospital for another opinion. The boyfriend says Shands is the second hospital and second opinion. The woman was initially hospitalized at Memorial Hospital in Jacksonville. According to comments on Channel 47’s website (http://www.cbs47.com), both the woman, boyfriend, and his family are unhappy that the parents went to the media or that Channel 47 did the story.

However, Channel 47 was right to broadcast this story. Unfortunately, the TV station was more interested in the family conflict than the real meat, pardon the pun, of the story.

It is news if someone has Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) in Jacksonville. What I found missing in the story was an elaboration on how she acquired CJD. It is news to me that one can get it other than by eating tainted meat. That may be true, but I did not know that. The story did not offer any evidence of that, either.

What I do know is that Mad Cow disease (which only cows or ruminants can have) has been found in the U.S., Canada, and Britain in recent years. In the past couple of months, there have been reports about downer cows being processed and their meat sent to market, especially to school cafeterias. It is my understanding that CJD has a long incubation period. I want more information on why doctors or the CDC think this patient did not acquire CJD from tainted meat. Or, is the CDC repressing news?

This is not the only recent case of CJD in the U.S. A Scott City, Kan. man, who worked for a meat packer 15-20 years ago, died of CJD, according to an article in The Wichita Eagle on March 28th. A Portsmouth, Va., woman is dying of it, as reported on WVEC-TV on April 7th.

The Kansas case is cause for concern. It could mean downer cows with Mad Cow disease entered the U.S. meat supply years ago. This is the aspect local and national news need to investigate further. I trust the doctors at Shands where I get most of my medical care, but I do not trust the CDC or the federal government to tell the truth.

The beef lobby is very powerful in Washington, D.C. The pressure to repress news about Mad Cow Disease is enormous. It would be devastating to the cattle industry, if Mad Cow tainted meat was sold in the United States. Nonetheless, we consumers have a right to know.

Sources:

CBS 47 Jacksonville http://www.cbs47.com/content/topstories/story.aspx?content_id=a37723ac-599c-4d3a-a810-d4c670df9a7b&rss=1

FOX News http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,342651,00.html

WVEC-TV, Portsmouth, VA http://www.wvec.com/news/topstories/stories/wvec_local_040708_mad_cow_disease.3fd7e5c7.html