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# More Britons live with variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease
- URL: https://www.foodconsumer.org/more_britons_live_with_variant_creutzfeldt_jakob_disease_1016130/
- Published: 2013-10-16T19:10:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-22T16:26:39.000Z
- Description: Researchers testing 32,000 appendix tissue samples from 41 UK hospitals estimate in the BMJ that as many as one in 2,000 Britons carry the abnormal prions behind variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, well above an earlier estimate of about 3,000 people.
- Author: Food Consumer
- Tags: Disease, Health News, #vivvo-import

Wed. Oct 16, 213 (foodconsumer.org) -- It was estimated early that about 3000 men and women in the U.K. carry abnormal proteins or infectious prion proteins that potentially cause human form of mad cow disease, variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease or vCJD. But now researchers reported in the BMJ that the actual number can be as high as one in 2000.

The new estimation came from a survey which tested 32,000 human tissue samples collected after appendix surgery carried out from 2000 through 2012 at 41 hospitals.

Variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease is caused by eating beef contaminated with mad cow disease or bovine spongiform encephalopathy. And the human form of mad cow disease does not necessarily all result in any symptoms or death. 

One observer in the U.S. claims that the mad cow proteins can cause many types of brain disorders, probably including Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson disease. 

Eating tainted beef is only one source for variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease. Medical equipment is another vehicle to spread the disease.

How many people may live with vCJD? No one knows. In the U.S., doctors are not required to report deaths from brain disorders and no patients need to be subject to any biopsy to confirm whether they die from the disease.

Although tainted beef is the major source of vCJD, beef in the U.S. is not tested for mad cow disease before placed on the market. In contrast, Japan tests each and every cow for the disease before beef goes to the market. 

Japan has reported more than 35 cases of mad cow disease, which has been found in young cows that are considered safe for human consumption in the U.S. (DL)