Why You Should Be Worried About the California Mad Cow Case

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26. Lame.

Mad cow disease may be misdiagnosed as dementia or Alzheimers

Colm Kelleher has authored a book about mad cow disease which manifests itself in humans as Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease or bovine spongiform encephalopathy. He believes that many deaths from Alzheimer’s and dementia may actually be misdiagnosed cases of BSE. He backs this statement up with research findings from Yale University and the University of Pittsburgh.[

http://www.rightdiagnosis.com/news/mad_cow_disease_may_be_misdiagnosed_as_dementia_or_alzheimers.htm

Mad cow disease is being misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's


Over the last 20 years the rates of Alzheimer's disease in the United States have skyrocketed.[60] According to the CDC, Alzheimer's Disease is now the eighth leading cause of death in the United States,[61] afflicting an estimated 4 million Americans.[62] Twenty percent or more of people clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, though, are found at autopsy not to have had Alzheimer's at all.[63] A number of autopsy studies have shown that a few percent of Alzheimer's deaths may in fact be CJD. Given the new research showing that infected beef may be responsible for some sporadic CJD, thousands of Americans may already be dying because of Mad Cow disease every year.[64]

Nobel Laureate Gajdusek, for example, estimates that 1% of people showing up in Alzheimer clinics actually have CJD.[65] At Yale, out of a series of 46 patients clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's, six were proven to have CJD at autopsy.[66] In another study of brain biopsies, out of a dozen patients diagnosed with Alzheimer's according to established criteria, three of them were actually dying from CJD.[67] An informal survey of neuropathologists registered a suspicion that CJD accounts for 2-12% of all dementias in general.[68] Two autopsy studies showed a CJD rate among dementia deaths of about 3%.[69,70] A third study, at the University of Pennsylvania, showed that 5% of patients diagnosed with dementia had CJD.[71] Although only a few hundred cases of sporadic CJD are officially reported in the U.S. annually,[72] hundreds of thousands of Americans die with dementia every year.[73] Thousands of these deaths may actually be from CJD caused by eating infected meat.

http://current.com/green/89114038_mad-cow-disease-is-being-misdiagnosed-as-alzheimers.htm

Could Mad Cow Disease Already be Killing Thousands of Americans Every Year?


Autopsy rates have dropped in the U.S. from 50% in the Sixties to less than 10% at present.[83] Although one reason autopsies are rarely performed on atypical dementia cases is that medical professionals are afraid of catching the disease,[84] the primary reason for the decline in autopsy rates in general appears to be financial. There is currently no direct reimbursement to doctors or hospitals for doing autopsies, which often forces the family to absorb the cost of transporting the body to an autopsy center and having the brain samples taken, a tab that can run upwards of $1500.[85]

Another problem is that the National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center itself remains underfunded. Paul Brown, medical director for the National Institutes of Health, has described the Center's budget as "pitiful," complaining that "there isn't any budget for CJD surveillance."[86] To adequately survey America's 290 million residents, "you need a lot of money." UK CJD expert Robert Will explains, "There was a CJD meeting of families in America in which... [the CDC] got attacked fairly vigorously because there wasn't proper surveillance. You could only do proper surveillance if you have adequate resources."[87] "I compare this to the early days of AIDS," says protein chemist Shu Chen, who directs the Center's lab, "when no one wanted to deal with the crisis."[88]

Andrew Kimbrell, the director of the Center for Food Safety, a D.C.-based public interest group, writes, "Given what we know now, it is unconscionable that the CDC is not strictly monitoring these diseases."[89] Given the presence of Mad Cow disease in the U.S., we need to immediately enact uniform active CJD surveillance on a national level, provide adequate funding not only for autopsies but also for the shipment of bodies, and require mandatory reporting of the disease in all 50 states. In Britain, even feline spongiform encephalopathy, the cat version of Mad Cow disease, is an officially notifiable illness. "No one has looked for CJD systematically in the U.S.," notes NIH medical director Paul Brown. "Ever."[90]

The animal agriculture industries continue to risk public safety, and the government seems to protect the industries' narrow business interests more than it protects its own citizens. Internal USDA documents retrieved through the Freedom of Information Act show that our government did indeed consider a number of precautionary measures as far back as 1991 to protect the American public from Mad Cow disease. According to one such document, however, the USDA explained that the "disadvantage" of these measures was that "the cost to the livestock and rendering industries would be substantial."[91]

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0107-07.htm

Much like the banks have captured their regulatory agencies,
the Meat & Food Industry has captured the FDA and the Department of Agriculture.
It doesn't take a "vast conspiracy" to capture Washington or the Regulatory Agencies.
All it takes is money and greed.
Just open your eyes.
Are you aware that Monsanto is powerful enough to place their man in the White House Cabinet as the Secretary of Agriculture?
Google: "Vilsack Ties to Monsanto"

Now, back to my original post.
I asked a question. (Hint: see the question mark).

[font color=blue]"Do you KNOW how many die from "Mad Cow",....and how many are just rubber stamped "Alzheimer's" or "Senile Dementia"?[/font]

You responded with a couple of laughable Strawmen and bluster,
but the correct answer is,
"No. You do not."
I have thoroughly documented the possibility and probability of mis-diagnoses above,
and thankfully, at least the Scientific Community is exploring this frightening scenario.

If you are counting on the Industry to regulate itself,
or for the anemic and captured regulatory agencies of the US Government stepping up to protect their citizens,
well...
Ask Oprah what happens if you question the Beef Industry.


"Don't worry!!
They're just venting a little steam."