Subject: Abattoir CJD death.

From: Oz <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Jun 1996 19:21:24 +0100

I just heard a report on the decision of a coroner's Court on the case
of an abbatoir worker who succumbed to CJD. UK Radio 4, News @ 19.00.

I did not record it, but here the salient features:

1) NOT a V-CJD case, but a normal CJD case.
2) He worked in an abattoir for 'about a year' in the 80's (?early?).
3) Reported as an enthusiastic eater who ate many things and liked beef.
4) The coroner recorded death by misadventure and said that BSE had
nothing to do with the CJD.

A statistian a few weeks ago pointed out that the number of workers
coming under high infection levels will be very much greater than the
base numbers would suggest due to changes in jobs.

A side effect of this is the difficulty of defining someones job over a
period ove over a decade, which one do you chose?

------------------------------- 
'Oz     "When I knew little, all was certain. The more I learnt,
        the less sure I was. Is this the uncertainty principle?"

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From: [email-masked] (Jim Scanlon)
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 13:05:24 GMT

> nothing to do with the CJD.

Do you know exactly how this gentleman died ? Was it suicide, or say
walking along a railroad track or on a road or something like that ?  Do
you know how old the man was?

It would seem that V-CJD case which affected young people might be missed
if they died from accidents,  or "misadventure". Older people might be
misclassified as suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

Please note the in 1987 three workers at the Hughes Aircraft Company's
Missile factory in Tucson died of CJ Disease. Two were in their 50s, and
one (unconfirmed, but pretty certain) was 27 and had worked there only 4
months or so. The occurrence of the three as well as three other cases
over a seven year period was reported as coincidental.

The emidemiologist who investigated the "cluster" found that five of the
six cases were Roman Catholic. 
I promise to summarize this report ASAP. 

Jim Scanlon

-- 
199 Canal St #8
San Rafael CA
94901
415-485-0540

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From: [email-masked] (Jim Scanlon)
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 13:09:53 GMT

> 3) Reported as an enthusiastic eater who ate many things and liked beef.

I wonder if the poor fellow ever lifted weights, or if he was self
consciously short. Or if he wore contact lenses or had cataracts, or if he
ever had root canals or oral surgery ?   I wonder what he did in the
abbatoir and what other jobs he worked at.

-- 
199 Canal St #8
San Rafael CA
94901
415-485-0540

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From: "Rafael Garcia" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1996 10:07:55 -0400

At the Institute of Food Technologists meeting in New Orleans last week,
I attended a session concerning wether there a true link between BSE and
CJD.  Researchers in the field presented evidence that BSE is likely not
transmittable to humans as CJD.  Mice, genetically engineered to produce
only normal human brain prions, were inoculated with the altered bovine
prion that causes BSE.  At 400 days these mice had shown no symptoms; the
study is continuing.  
	There was some evidence presented the showed a rise in BSE cases
coinciding with a change in rendering practices in Britain (presumably
allowing BSE prions to remain intact).  Apparently BSE can spread from cow
to cow when a slaughtered, infected animal is used a feed for a healthy
animal.

-- 
Rafael Garcia
Cornell Food Safety Laboratory

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From: Oz <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Jul 1996 10:46:17 +0100

In article <[email-masked]>, Jim Scanlon
<[email-masked]> writes
>you know how old the man was?

It was a week ago. I gotbthe impression that it was a 'normal' CJD
death.

>misclassified as suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

Apparently the pathology of V-CJD is very different. One thing (I have a
report, but have not yet read it properly) about V-CJD is that
electroencephalograms are NOT like CJD so many cases may not be related
to CJD unless a tissue sample is taken.

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From: Oz <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Jul 1996 10:51:23 +0100

In article <[email-masked]>, Jim Scanlon
<[email-masked]> writes
>abbatoir and what other jobs he worked at.

It is, in my opinion, a mistake to assume that all cases of CJD must
have some infective cause. In some cases this is the case, but in others
it seems to be genuinely sporadic.