990378 British Mad Cow Linked Deaths Rise

London - Deaths from a human brain ailment related to mad cow disease increased markedly in the last quarter of 1998 in Britain, according to a report published today. Scientists said the significance was unclear.

Nine human deaths from a new variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, an incurable illness that eats holes in the brain, were confirmed during the last three months of 1998, according to a report in The Lancet, a British medical journal. Previously there had been no more than five deaths in any three-month period.

The new variant of CJD has been linked to a disease in cattle known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease.

An epidemic of the cattle disease led the European Union to impose a global ban on the export of British beef, but most of those restrictions were lifted last year.

The report from the National Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit, based in Edinburgh, Scotland, said the number of deaths during the quarter in 1998 was unusual, but it was unclear whether the increase was due to chance or would continue.

The Department of Health reported that 15 people died of the new variant CJD in 1998, compared with 10 in each of the previous two years. One death was confirmed in January of this year.

The number of deaths from all forms of the disease in Britain declined from 79 in 1997 to 60 last year. That was due to a sharp decrease - from 58 deaths in 1997 to 39 in 1998 - in mortality due to sporadic CJD, an older form of the illness that is not associated with the cattle disease.

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