Watch for new wave of mad cow: Masters

While the incidence of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) -- the human form of mad cow disease -- appears to have slowed in the UK after 146 confirmed cases since the epidemic began in the mid-1990's, a new wave of cases could be waiting in the wings, according to Australian neuroscientist Prof Colin Masters.

Masters, who gave the 37th Halford Oration at the University of Melbourne this week, has been studying CJD and similar diseases on and off since his days as a medical student in Perth in the late 1960's.

"In the last year, it appears that the epidemic has turned the corner, and it appears to be abating," he said. "But it will take time to see if that is really the case."

But recently, scientists have become concerned that the slow-to-develop prion disease may be spread through the blood. If so, a new wave of cases will begin to show up in the next few years, Masters said, and there will be an increased need for diagnostic tools and therapeutic options to combat the disease.

So far no Australians have developed the disease, although Masters believes that it is only a matter of time. "We estimated that Australia would have one vCJD case per 100 British cases, but there have been none as yet," he said. "But blood transmission cases are a much more serious threat currently."

Masters' research has implicated the binding of metals to the PrP prion protein in the misfolding process which leads to the disease. The process is similar to that observed in two other neurodegenerative diseases studied by Masters, Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. But metal binding to PrP is not attenuated by the chelating agent clioquinol, shown to be effective at slowing down the progression of the other two diseases, Masters said.