Human spongiform encephalopathies

The spongiform encephalopathies (SEs) are fatal neurodegenerative diseases of unknown cause which can affect animals and man. If they are now emerging from the shadows, it is because of the wide media coverage of the current epidemic of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), the newest member of this group of diseases, which has already claimed the lives of more than 20,000 cows in the UK. The human spongiform encephalopathies (HSEs) are becoming better known because of the large number of newspaper and broadcast articles which have addressed the possibility that cases of HSE might arise as a result of consuming meat from BSE-affected cattle. The human spongiform encephalopathies are Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), the Gerstmann-Straussler-Scheinker syndrome (GSS), and Kuru seems very unlikely that this route of transmission could breach the species barrier and result in disease in humans who had eaten beef from animals incubating disease. The removal of affected cattle from the food chain and the ban on the use of all offals which came into force in 1988 should remove even the remotest chance of this happening. We, at any rate, are happy to eat the roast beef of old England.