9 cases of brain-wasting disease in Idaho

[elehhhhna]

Boston.com/AP ^ | October 17, 2005 | Rebecca Boone

BOISE, Idaho --From the moment Joan Kingsford first saw her husband stagger in his welding shop, she wanted two things: His recovery and to know what made him sick.

She got neither. Alvin Kingsford, 72, died recently of suspected sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the fatal brain-wasting illness. The disease can be conclusively diagnosed only with an autopsy, which did not take place.

State and federal health officials are trying to get to the bottom of nine reported cases of suspected sporadic CJD in Idaho this year. Sporadic, or naturally occurring, CJD differs from the permutation dubbed variant CJD, which is caused by eating mad-cow-tainted beef and has killed at least 180 people in the United Kingdom and continental Europe since the 1990s.

"One thing is very clear in Idaho -- the number seems to be higher than the number reported in previous years," said Dr. Ermias Belay, a CJD expert with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "So far, the investigations have not found any evidence of any exposure that might be common among the cases."
http://www.boston.com/yourlife/health/diseases/articles/2005/10/17/9_reported_case_of_suspected_cjd_in_idaho/?rss_id=Boston.com+%2F+News

[Cactus44]

1. We were just talking about that.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1855604

[elehhhhna]

3. oopsie! sorry.

[sui generis]

2. not to mention in Crawford Texas and Washington, DC

Although there may be an overlap in that statistic.

:evilgrin:

[ohio_liberal]

4. Wonder if he was a hunter?

I didn't read the whole article. I'm betting he ate wild game.

[EC]

5. And why would that cause it?

Hasn't it been determined already that using old cow entrails in their feed is what causes this?

[WritingIsMyReligion]

6. "Brain-wasting disease"

Not to knock on those who actually suffer from that illness, but isn't 39% of the population experiencing this right now? At least, that's the number according to Gallup...