Mike Hancock News
Mike Hancock backs mum in her fight for justice for son who died of human "mad cow disease" as experts warn of a new vCJD "timebomb"
Mike is this week putting down a parliamentary motion congratulating Christine on her campaign which has included a website www.justiceforandy.com and a documentary for BBC South called “Who Killed My Son?” which can also be viewed on the website. Mike now wants the BBC to show the documentary nationwide across the whole network. He also wants urgent action from the Government to prevent further possible deaths from vCJD – particularly through blood transfusions.
Mike Hancock said: “This is something that no mother wants to go through. The loss of her son at such a young age must have been devastating for Christine. She has shown tremendous courage to produce her documentary and establish her website. I am pleased to have been able to highlight her work in Parliament and back my constituent’s fight for justice.”
The figures on vCJD are shocking. There have been 167 confirmed deaths from vCJD to date in the UK. This compares with just three in America despite the USA having five times our population. The country with the next highest incidence of vCJD is France with 23 but most other countries have had a maximum of three.
Mike Hancock said: “I was shocked when I looked into this to see how many more deaths there have been from vCJD compared to other countries. These are 167 unnecessary deaths. If the Government and meat producers had acted in a different way, I am sure that they could have been avoided.”
According to the Government up to 35,000 people in the UK may be carrying “sub-clinical” vCJD and have the rogue agents, prions that cause vCJD without having developed the disease or knowing that they are carrying it. They could then pass on the disease to others unwittingly, through giving blood. People who have had blood transfusions are banned from giving blood. But the Government has yet to decide whether to take additional measures to protect the blood supply such as prion filtration which would cost £200 million a year. In a written parliamentary answer the health minister said that they would complete evaluation of prion filtration of the blood supply in 2008 and other measures in 2009. 3 people so far are known to have died from infected blood transfusion. The National Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit has concluded that blood transfusion is beyond reasonable doubt a transmission route for vCJD
There may also be more deaths from vCJD. So far all those that have died from vCJD have a particular genetic make-up called M-M. It was thought that may be people of other genetic make-ups (M-V (51% of the population) and V-V – (12% of the population)) were not susceptible to actually getting the disease. However research among the tribes of Papua New Guinea show these genetic types may just develop the disease later – as much as 30-50 years after getting the rogue agents that cause vCJD. Therefore, those that have died from it so far may only be the first wave.
A tribe in Papua New Guinea get a CJD-like disease called kuru. In the past, women to supplement their diet, have eaten the brains of recently diseased tribe members. However although this was stopped in 1957, people are still continuing to die from kuru. The latest cases have affected those with the M-V genotype.
Mike Hancock said: “There are still many unanswered questions from the ’80s and ’90s as to what happened about BSE and contaminated meat. We still need to get to the bottom of what happened. Identifying those that may have been affected but have yet to develop any symptoms could for example stop them giving blood. I am urging the Government to undertake further research on common factors, particularly school meals. It might also help them dieing from the disease later on in life as some experimental treatments are already available and more may be available later on. If anyone has any further information that might be useful on this then please get in touch with my office on 023 92 861055 or Christine Lord via her website.”
“The Government should also be operating the precautionary principle and acting quickly to protect the blood supply. If prion filtration is shown to be effective then it should be brought in immediately. There is a real fear that there may be many thousand of carriers of the rogue prions. They could infect the blood supply leading to a new wave of infections.”
The text of Mike Hancock’s Early Day Motion (EDM) which will be published on Tuesday 15th July: “This house notes that there have been to date 167 confirmed cases of variant Creutzfelt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) in the UK including three through blood transfusion, compared to 3 in total in the USA, and therefore congratulates and welcomes the work of Christine Lord in establishing a website www.justiceforandy.com and producing a BBC South documentary, “Who Killed My Son” which it asks the BBC to screen nationwide and which can be watched on www.justiceforandy.com – following her son, Andy's tragic death at 24 from vCJD and the death from vCJD of another six young people living within 25 miles of Portsmouth and in light of this, asks the Government to commission further research to establish any common factors among vCJD victims in South Hampshire as well as elsewhere in the country such as school catering, and also in noting the written parliamentary answer from the health minister on 11th March 2008, giving a vCJD sub-clinical prevalence estimate of up to 1 in 1,400 of the population, asks that the Government completes its evaluation of screening for prions in the blood supply and other possible measures to protect the blood supply as soon as possible in light of the conclusions reported in the fifteenth annual report of the the National Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit that blood transfusion is beyond reasonable doubt a possible transmission route for vCJD.”
A report on the research in Papua New Guinea can be obtained from: news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1235525.stm .
There are details on the deaths from blood transfusions at www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/health/article664298.ece
The 15th Report of the National Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit can be obtained from www.cjd.ed.ac.uk/report15.pdf and the home page of the unit is at www.cjd.ed.ac.uk including details for the worldwide deaths – to date: The number of confirmed deaths (definite or probable) in different countries as at June 2008 from the Surveillance Unit – the brackets show those still alive: UK, 164 (3); France, 23 (0); Republic of Ireland, 4 (0); Italy, 1 (0); USA, 3 (0); Canada, 1 (0); Saudi Arabia, 1 (1); Japan, 1 (0);Netherlands, 2 (0); Portugal, 2 (1); Spain, 3 (0). On 11th March 2008, the Health Minister, Dawn Primarolo gave the following written answer:: The Department currently uses a variant Creutzfeldt Jakob disease (vCJD) sub-clinical prevalence estimate based on one study of tonsil and appendix samples which identified three affected samples out of 12,674 tested. This suggests a prevalence of about 1 in 4,000, though with very wide ranges of uncertainty and a statistical confidence interval of between 1 in 1,400 and 1 in 20,000. She went on to say: “Our current estimate, based on information supplied by manufacturers and NHS blood and transplant, is that the cost per annum of introducing prion filtration for all United Kingdom blood donations is approximately £200,000,000.”
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