Guide for mad cow post mortems

Two Balearic Insalud public health service hospitals, Son Dureta in Majorca and Can Misses in Ibiza, have been provided with guides on how to carry out post mortems on suspected victims of the human strain of Creutzfeldt-Jakob, mad cow. The guides have been supplied to a number of hospitals across the country by the Ministry for Health and all hospitals have been asked to set up data bases of all the information about post mortems which have been carried out on suspect bodies. The guides stipulate than any suspect post mortems must be carried out by a team of three people, one of whom has to be a pathologist, and that special protective clothing, double gloves and facial visors, must be worn. The Spanish health service has set up a chain of information, co-ordination and support points for hospitals who have not been issued with the special instruction guide so that medical advice is on hand for doctors having to carry out a suspected mad cow post mortem.