18 People Might Have Been Exposed to an Incurable Disease in U.S. Hospital: Report

U.S. health authorities said on Tuesday, Feb. 11 that at least 18 neurosurgery patients might have been exposed to an incurable disease in a North Carolina hospital.

According to a report published by CNN, authorities of the Novant Health Forsyth Medical Center in Winstons-Salem are in the process of notifying the 18 patients, although for the moment its unknown if more people might have been affected.

"Today we're contacting 18 neurosurgery patients, who were exposed to the Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (ECJ) during the past three weeks at the Forsyth Medical Center", said the hospital's president, Jeff Lindsay, in a press release, quoted by CNN.

The incident happened last Jan. 18, when a patient with ECJ symptoms underwent a series of tests that confirmed the diagnosis.

The hospital said that the surgical instruments used on the patient were sterilized according to the medical center's standard protocols; however, since this was a case of ECJ, the instruments should have been subjected to additional processes to guarantee their safe use.

Although medical authorities have declared that the probability of the patients being infected through the surgical equipment is very remote, the hospital is currently notifying 18 patients so they can undergo tests to dismiss these fears.

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is an incurable pathology that affects about one person in one million around the world; it causes bad memory, blindness, involuntary movements and coma.

The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke estimates that this disease kills 90 percent of patients suffering it in less than a year, according to Reuters.

The same source details that the patients suffering from ECJ might go through a period of incubation (before initial symptoms surface) which might take various years. However, once the first symptoms are present, patients die in an average of four months.

Authorities of the Novant Health Forsyth Medical Center reported that there is currently no treatment to fight this disease that affects 300 Americans every year.