What is mad cow disease?

Mad cow disease is a fatal disease that slowly destroys the brain and spinal cord (central nervous system) in cattle. It also is known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE.

People cannot get mad cow disease. But in rare cases they may get a human form of mad cow disease called variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), which is fatal. Over time, vCJD destroys the brain and spinal cord.

Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) causes the brain to become damaged over time. It is fatal. Symptoms include:

• Tingling, burning, or prickling in the face, hands, feet, and legs. But there are much more common illnesses that cause these same symptoms. Having tingling in parts of your body does not mean you have vCJD.
• Dementia.
• Psychosis.
• Problems moving parts of the body. As the disease gets worse, a person is no longer able to walk.
• Coma.

If a person does eat nerve tissue from an infected cow, he or she may not feel sick right away. The time it takes for symptoms to occur after you're exposed to the disease is not known for sure, but experts think it is years.

There is no single test to diagnose variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD). Doctors may think that a person has vCJD based on where the person has lived and the person's symptoms and past health. Imaging tests, such as an MRI, may be done to check for brain changes caused by vCJD. Other tests may include a lumbar puncture or an electroencephalogram (EEG).

A brain biopsy is the only way to confirm a diagnosis of vCJD.

There is no cure for variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD). Treatment includes managing the symptoms that occur as the disease gets worse.