Middletown health department briefs board on Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease after one local case

At the Aug. 12 meeting of the City of Middletown Board of Health and Environment, Dr. Genowy delivered an educational presentation on Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease (CJD), and Medical Director Dr. Dunnewein reported the department had one confirmed case in July. Dr. Dunnewein said “that patient was 70 years old, and it was a month from when they started seeing symptoms” before the diagnosis was returned after the patient died.

The presentation summarized what speakers described as the key clinical facts about CJD, a rare prion disease that the presenter said “is a 100 percent fatal incurable, disorder with a very rapid progression.” The board heard that CJD belongs to a family of transmissible spongiform encephalopathies; it may occur spontaneously, be inherited, be acquired by exposure, or present as the variant form linked to bovine spongiform…