To Whom It May
Concern:
Although I realize I missed the deadline
for submitting comments to the TSE Advisory Committee (I did not
receive the notice of this meeting until 05 Dec 98), I hope you
will take the time to review my comments.
I am an Air Force retiree who has been following
Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease and TSE for several years due to my
study of human biology in college. I am one of an estimated
50,000 or more military personnel and their families who were
stationed for various lengths of time in the United Kingdom in
the 1980s and 1990s. It was not unusual for the military
"chow halls" and "in-flight kitchens" to
serve British beef. Additionally, British beef was part of the
menu at private eating establishments either directly on base
(i.e., Burger King as well as native British establishments) or
in close proximity to U.S. bases. Finally, British beef was also
sold at the various shoppettes and commissaries on U.S. bases. It
seems obvious that a number of service personnel and their
families consumed British beef during their assignments to the
United Kingdom. Whether that beef was infected (sic) with BSE
will not be known until nvCJD symptoms become noticeable in these
personnel.
It should also not come as a surprise that U.S. military
personnel probably volunteer as blood and blood product donors at
a higher rate than the general population. Many see it as a duty
to help out their local communities not unlike serving their
country. It does not require a large jump in deduction to realize
that a number of personnel who were stationed in Britain and ate
British beef have since returned to the U.S. and have continued
to be active blood donors.
If you doubt the efficacy of these statements let me provide you
with a brief history of my own case. I began donating blood soon
after joining the Air Force in 1976 and continued donating on a
pretty regular basis up until this last summer (1998). Between
1982 and 1994, I traveled and was stationed in Britain close to a
dozen times or more. These temporary duty assignments lasted
anywhere from three to four days up to 90 days at a time. I can't
think of a single time that I was in Britain that I did not eat
British beef. I would be surprised if there were not thousands of
other service personnel who could tell you a very similar story
as my own. Once I was convinced of the correlation between BSE
infected beef and the development of TSE or nvCJD in humans, I
could no longer conscientiously donate blood knowing that I may
be carrying and thus passing on the TSE pathogen (sic) to others
through my donated blood.
In my opinion, given the causal relationship between BSE and TSE
in humans, screening those blood donors who have resided in Great
Britain during the 1980s and early 1990s is a prudent course to
take. Currently individuals who lived in Africa since 1977 are
screened from giving blood to prevent the possibility of passing
on the HIV virus. Though TSE does not destroy the infected
individual as quickly as AIDS does from HIV, CJD/TSE is no less
lethal in its course and outcome, and as yet, I know of no known
drugs to slow down its course (unlike HIV). Thank you.
Sincerely,
Terrence C Goodwin
USAF Retired