§ Mr. Ron DaviesTo ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to his answer of 18 May,Official Report, column 289, what alternative methods of monitoring Creutzfeldt Jakob dementia he is considering.
§ Mr. FreemanWe are seeking to establish a national register of all cases of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, validated by experts in this field. A similar methodology has been used with success in the past: details can be found in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry (1975) Vol. 38, pages 210–13 and (1988) Vol. 51, 1113–19.
§ Mr. Ron DaviesTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what information his Department now possesses about the incidence of Creutzfeldt Jakob dementia.
§ Mr. FreemanThe mean annual mortality rate of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in England and Wales for the last period studied in detail (1980–84 inclusive) was 0.49 million. Currently, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is given on death certificates as the underlying cause of death in about 30 deaths a year.
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§ Mr. FreemanThe medical royal colleges are responsible for deciding the content of their examinations. However, officials wrote to the Conference of medical royal colleges on 10 November 1988, drawing attention to the relevant recommendation of the Hoffenberg report.