Transfusions link to vCJD

Infection through transfusions has only been admitted as a theoritical possibility

LONDON, England -- Scientists have discovered the possibility of contracting the human form of mad cow disease through blood transfusions could be higher than previously believed.

The UK government is now considering banning people who have received transfusions from giving blood.

Researchers from the Institute for Animal Health conducting experiments on sheep found one in six animals given blood infected with a similar disease to variant Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) went on to develop the disease.

It is not known if the results would be repeated with vCJD in humans but previously the chances of contracting vCJD, an incurable brain-rotting disease, through transfusions had been admitted only as theoretical possibility.

A Department of Health spokeswoman told Reuters: "Our assessment has been that the blood of vCJD patients may contain transmittable levels of infectivity before clinical signs of the disease are apparent."

IN-DEPTH Mad cow disease

She added that banning people who have received transfusion from giving blood was one of a number of options being considered.

Across Europe there have been more than 100 deaths from vCJD, most of them in Britain but they are thought to have caught the disease by eating beef contaminated with BSE or mad cow disease.

There are as yet no confirmed cases of catching vCJD from blood transfusions.

White blood cells, regarded as the most dangerous potential carriers of vCJD, are already removed from transfusion blood in the UK.

BSE and vCJD were first linked in the UK in 1996 despite previous denials that the cow form could jump from species to species.

A decade earlier BSE -- a disease itself similar to scrapie in sheep -- had been discovered.

Experts believe BSE was created when cows were fed scrapie-infected feed and that eating infected beef is the most likely cause of contracting vCJD.