It was announced this week that a new blood based test for the detection of variant CJD has been developed by a group in London, UK. The assay had a sensitivity of 71.4% and a specificity of 100%. The only positive samples detected were from patients with variant CJD. This assay is not currently available outside this group’s research setting and no persons with haemophilia and who are in the at risk group for variant CJD have been tested. The abstract of the scientific paper describing the test can be found here

9 FEB 2011 NEW BLOOD-BASED TEST FOR VARIANT CJD