National Reference Laboratory denies mad cow disease reports

The National Reference Laboratory has denied media reports claiming that a Czech woman had been diagnosed with the human form of BSE, also known as mad cow disease. The laboratory said that in actual fact the 60-year-old woman had been diagnosed with sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jacobs Disease which appears in a random occurrence, and has no known genetic or environmental cause. Sporadic CJD chiefly affects people between 50 and 75 years of age and can be mistaken for senility.