★ Editor's Choice ★ A case cluster of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease linked to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Michael B. Coulthart, Michael D. Geschwind, Shireen Qureshi, Nicolas Phielipp, Alex Demarsh, Joseph Y. Abrams, Ermias Belay, Pierluigi Gambetti, Gerard H. Jansen, Anthony E. Lang, Lawrence B. Schonberger DOI:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/aww206 2609-2616 First published online: 26 September 2016
[h=2]Summary[/h] As of mid-2016, 231 cases of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease?the human form of a prion disease of cattle, bovine spongiform encephalopathy?have been reported from 12 countries. With few exceptions, the affected individuals had histories of extended residence in the UK or other Western European countries during the period (1980?96) of maximum global risk for human exposure to bovine spongiform encephalopathy. However, the possibility remains that other geographic foci of human infection exist, identification of which may help to foreshadow the future of the epidemic.
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These findings support the hypothesis that human infection with bovine spongiform encephalopathy occurred in Saudi Arabia.
