California man had mad cow symptoms!

California man had mad cow symptoms: "RIVERSIDE, Calif., Jan 06, 2005 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Health officials have ruled out the human version of mad cow disease in a California death, but a neurologist said the man had symptoms of the fatal disease.

Patrick Hicks, 49, died late last year in Colton, Calif., and his neurologist, Dr. Ron Bailey of Riverside Medical Center in Riverside suspected possible variant Creutzfeldt Jakob disease, a fatal condition humans can contract from eating beef products infected with the mad cow pathogen.



'Clinically, the case did look like it was variant CJD -- no question about that,' Bailey told UPI.

However, he said, the National Prion Disease Pathology Surveillance Center in Cleveland concluded in late December that Hicks had a similar disease called sporadic CJD, which is not thought to be due to contaminated beef.

NPDPSC said it could not comment on Hicks' final diagnosis.

Bailey questions how NPDPSC arrived at the diagnosis because he doesn't think enough testing was done to rule out vCJD.

Bailey has additional concerns because the manner in which Hicks' brain was preserved makes it impossible to carry out additional tests that would've helped determine whether he had vCJD or CJD.

'Some questions remain as far as I'm concerned,' Bailey said."