Further moves possible in UK on CJD
The UK's National Blood Authority is considering banning the use of plasma from British donors in blood transfusions or as raw material for the extraction of blood products. Reports in the UK national press on Sunday September 17, say the proposed move is in response to research showing that bovine spongiform encephalopathy (or mad cow disease) can be transmitted in the blood of infected animals. The study published in the Lancet medical journal on September 15 involved blood taken from sheep exposed to BSE but which were yet to show any clinical signs of the disease. So far 82 people in Britain are known to have been infected with new variant Creutzfeldt Jakob disease (vCJD), the condition believed to have been caused by eating beef from BSE infected cattle. The authority has found that seven of the victims were regular blood donors before going on to develop the disease. There are no proper records of which patients received the potentially infected blood as donations of whole or processed blood is often pooled with that of other donors before distribution to hospitals. Since 1999 all blood from British donors used in the National Health Service blood donation scheme has been processed to remove the white blood cells believed to be the most likely source of infection. Most plasma used in British hospitals is also imported from countries with no record of new variant CJD but about 100,000 units are derived from UK donors. Moreover, it is impossible to ensure that all white blood cells are removed and there is also a risk that other components of blood may contain the infective agent. Further concerns about the transmission of nvCJD emerged following the press stories. It was announced that a woman who became pregnant while incubating the disease may have transmitted it to her unborn child. The woman, who lived in Warwickshire but has not been named, died in May this year when her child was seven-months old. The child, who was born by Caesarean section, began showing behavioural and developmental problems within two days of birth. Although, doctors cannot confirm whether the child does have nvCJD, similar conditions in animals are known to be passed across the placenta from an infected mother to its offspring.