Mad Cow Infected Blood 'to kill 1000'

[Beaaware]

www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10024078/Mad-cow-infected-blood-to-kill-1000.html

As am I Bea - hadn't read all the replies when I posted.

Beware so sorry
Agree that this could be a time Bomb
Is current blood screened for vcjd

Major, it's very very very very unlikely you've been affected. Please don't worry.

I used to get the regular updates from govt. statisticians on CJD cases. Each figure represented appalling heartbreak and suffering, but the astonishing thing was that there were so few, given almost everyone in the country was exposed to BSE, repeatedly and for a long period of time.

This latest research is about a potential risk - it needs further research and is important for government policy but it's not something that should panic anyone right now. We may, almost all of us, continue to be lucky.

its something on my mind too. When I had my blood transfusion I had refused one for a week because I was frightenend of CJD, Then a doctor came and told me all blood products were screened. (this was 2003). She lied. I still cant get over that. After 2 pints had gone in I turned on the TV and lo, a BBC news story saying those who had recieved blood could no longer give blood as blood wasnt screened, I couldnt believe it. The doctor spluttered and said oh it was for the best as I would recover faster. I would have recovered anyhow but slower.
And now I fret.

I'm due an operation soon and know I'll have to sign a transfusion consent form ... Dreading it

Awful for the OP to have lost her son to CJD - whether BSE or idiopathic

BUT

when you start digging, all teh news stories about the 'looming epedemic' in the last ten years have been linked to research teams bigging up their work at funding renewal time.

I am sorry I've been rude to you in the past Beaware, but I agree 100% with Talkinpeace.

infamouspoo
The main risk from blood has always been hepatitis C : and the chances of that are tens of thousands of times higher than of CJD.

CJD and all other types of motor / endocrine / neurological disease are horrible for the sufferer and those around them
BUT
it does appear that the human digestion can cope with those prions - unlike the ruminant digestion
which is why the CJD epidemic has never happened : I ate cattle cake of the dubious sort (too much time spent on farms) in the early 1970's
and it was in the food chain from around 1974 till around 2000.
If it was going to happen, the header curve would have kicked in by now.
It hasn't.

Worry about things that are likely to happen.