Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease

Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) or new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (nvCJD) is a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy which was identified in 1996 by the National CJD Surveillance Unit in Edinburgh. Over 170 cases of vCJD have been recorded in the United Kingdom, and around 30 cases in the rest of the world. The fact that the epidemiology of the disease coincided with an epidemic of Bovine spongiform encephalopathy led to the hypothesis that consumption of BSE-infected beef caused the disease.