Health bosses have issued a press statement after a resident of the island was diagnosed with Cruetzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD).
The Department of Health said that a few people in the island had become aware of this and had raised some concerns.
The patient was a woman in her fifties, iomtoday.co.im understands.
She had a form of CJD referred to as Sporadic CJD (sCJD), the department said. sCJD is a condition that occurs in about one in a million people.
The Department of Health said: ‘sCJD is not related to beef, cattle or any animals or to occupation, travel or any other leisure activities.’
It added: ‘The form of CJD, sCJD, is non-infectious and there is no risk of transmission of the disease.
‘Specifically sCJD is not related to beef or cattle and there is no need to be concerned about eating beef as part of a healthy diet.’
Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE or mad cow disease) is believed to be the cause of variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob (vCJD) disease in humans.
Dr Parameswaran Kishore, the director of public health in the island, said he couldn’t say whether the patient had died or not for reasons of ‘medical confidentiality’.