THE father of a North Yorkshire CJD victim has accused the Government of complacency over the disease, after research showed more than one in 1,000 people may be carrying it.

Holly Mills, 25, of Thornton-le-Dale, near Pickering, has survived for eight years since doctors diagnosed her as suffering from the devastating illness variant CJD.

Her father, Peter, is convinced she is only alive today because of a revolutionary treatment, using a drug called pentosan polysulphate, she has been prescribed since 2003.

He spoke out yesterday after research revealed almost 60,000 people may unknowingly have the disease.

The research involved testing 30,000 appendixes removed in operations between 2000 and 2011.

In interim findings on 13,878 samples, four CJD cases were identified, a rate of 288 cases per million, and there are suggestions the true figure might be even higher.

The news comes months after SEAC (the spongiform encephalopathy advisory committee) was scrapped as part of the coalition Government’s “bonfire of the quangos”, with its functions passed on to the health department’s advisory committee on dangerous pathogens.

Mr Mills said the findings of the new research led him to fear there would be a second wave of CJD in the British population in the future, and it had shown the Government was wrong to get rid of SEAC. He said the organisation had gathered together the expertise which could deal with any such second wave, but this was being lost with its demise.

He said: “There’s an attitude that the whole issue has gone away, a complacency.”

A Department of Health spokeswoman said that CJD research remained a priority for Government.

She said: “We have put in place a range of precautionary measures to reduce the risk of potential vCJD transmission through medical interventions.

“We have recently made £2.4 million available over the next four years to fund decontamination research.”