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Article: Age and variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.(Dispatches)
- Article from:
- Emerging Infectious Diseases
- Article date:
- December 1, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 U.S. National Center for Infectious Diseases. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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The young and stable median age of those who die of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease has been attributed to age-dependent infection rates. This analysis shows that an influence of age on risk for death after infection better explains age patterns, suggesting that biologic factors peaking in the third decade of life may hasten disease.
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The epidemic of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) in Great Britain is now thought to be caused by the same prion responsible for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle (1). A striking feature of the human epidemic has been the young age of most patients and the lack of any trend toward older ...