RESEARCH INTO VARIANT CREUTZFELDT-JAKOB DISEASE

Early day motion 2024, tabled 14 July 2008 by Mike Hancock (Liberal Democrat). Signed by 28 members.

That this House notes the 167 confirmed cases of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) in the UK, including three through blood transfusion, compared with three in total in the USA; congratulates and welcomes the work of Christine Lord, following the tragic death of her son Andy from vCJD at the age of 24, in establishing a website, www.justiceforandy.com, and producing a BBC South documentary Who Killed My Son which can be watched on www.justiceforandy.com; asks the BBC to screen the documentary nationwide; notes the death from vCJD of another six young people living within 25 miles of Portsmouth; further asks the Government to commission further research to establish common factors, such as school catering, among vCJD victims in South Hampshire as well as elsewhere in the country; further notes the written answer from the Minister of State for Health on 11th March 2008, giving a vCJD sub-clinical prevalence estimate of up to 1 in 1,400 of the population; and further asks that the Government completes its evaluation of screening for prions in blood supply and other possible measures to protect the blood supply as soon as possible, in light of the conclusions reported in the 15th annual report of the National Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit that blood transfusion is beyond reasonable doubt a possible transmission route for vCJD.

Signatures by party: Labour 20, Liberal Democrat 5, Independent 2, Conservative 1.