On closer inspection, however, the researchers found that they had high levels of potentially lethal abnormal prions in their brains. The researchers also showed that this subclinical infection could easily be passed on when injected into healthy mice and hamsters. Deaths from the disease in the UK have risen from three in 1995 to 14 in 1999. Fourteen people have died from vCJD in the first six months of this year alone, compared to 18 in the whole of 1998. Like BSE, first diagnosed in 1986, it is a poorly understood condition that attacks the brain, leaving it full of holes like a bath sponge.
Victims display symptoms of dementia, becoming unsteady and confused and losing their memory.
As the brain degenerates, they decline to a state where they cannot walk, talk or look after themselves. There is no known cure. Local vet called to farm in Kent to examine a cow behaving oddly. Later judged to have been the first case of BSE in Britain. Nov 1986 First official diagnosis of BSE, the neurodegenerative condition characterised by holes in the brain.