State’s first victim died in 1999

THE State’s first victim of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) died more than six years ago.

Kay Turner, 33, died in August 1999 in her home in Portlaoise after being discharged from a hospice in the town.

Her husband, Michael, and their two young children, James (now 11) and Enya (now nine) were with her when she died.

When Ms Turner became unwell in November 1998, Mr Turner brought her to St Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin. Doctors initially said she was depressed and prescribed medication before sending her home.

Ms Turner first started complaining of a tingling sensation in her legs and then started losing her balance. She later suffered memory loss.

Ms Turner’s mother-in-law, Ursula Turner, who worked as a cleaner for a number of doctors, eventually got her an appointment with a young female doctor.

The doctor immediately realised Ms Turner was suffering from a serious neurological condition and arranged for her to be admitted immediately to St Vincent’s Hospital.

That was at the start of May 1999. Ms Turner began hallucinating and was easily aggravated. Weeks later she was sent to Beaumont Hospital where she was diagnosed with vCJD.

In the last few months of her life Ms Turner was unable to talk. Her husband lost his job as a chef because he had to spend every day with his wife.

It is believed that Ms Turner contracted the disease in the 1980s when she and her husband both worked as chefs, but the question of whether she ate infected indigenous beef cannot be answered.

This week it was disclosed that members of the woman’s family live close to Jason Moran’s home in Shankill.

He died last summer, just 10 months after he was diagnosed with vCJD.

Only one vCJD victim, Jonathan Simms, 21, from Belfast, has so far survived, but he remains in a coma-like state. He received an experimental drug treatment in an attempt to prolong his life.