HL Deb 27 March 2000 vol 611 cc56-7WA
Lord Lucas

asked Her Majesty's Government:

What progress has been made on evaluating the capillary electrophoresis test, developed by Mary Jo Schmerr of the National Animal Disease Centre of the United States Department of Agriculture, for abnormal prions in blood; what tests are under way; and when it is expected that they will be completed. [HL1546]

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

The test currently under development by Dr Schmerr has undergone some preliminary evaluation at: the Medical Research Council Prion Unit, London; the National Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit, Edinburgh; and the Veterinary Laboratory Agency, Weybridge. An application for a full evaluation of this, and other, blood tests is being considered by the Government. Before a diagnostic test such as this can be used to determine whether people or animals are infected with a transmissible encephalopathy agent at a pre-clinical stage, it will be necessary for the test to be fully developed and scientifically validated. We are not yet able to predict when any of these blood tests currently being developed will be completed.

Lord Lucas

asked Her Majesty's Government:

What progress has been made on the programme of screening tonsils removed in routine operations for the presence of abnormal prions; and whether they will publish the results of the screening to date. [HL1547]

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

Two retrospective studies to examine samples of tonsil and appendix tissue taken from 15,000 patients in the South West of England and 3,000 in the Lothian Region of Scotland for the presence of abnormal prions commenced in the spring of 1999. The first preliminary results from these studies are likely to be available during the spring and will then be considered by the Department of Health, the Medical Research Council and relevant scientific experts including the Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee. An announcement will be made about the findings.

An additional prospective study proposed by the London Prion Unit at St Mary's Hospital, to look at 2,000 tonsil specimens, has recently obtained ethical approval from the London Multi-centre Regional Ethical Committee and this study should be under way shortly.