East Hills, NY (March 17, 2005) -- An update on Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies (TSEs), including variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD), the human form of "mad cow" disease, was a key topic at the Food & Drug Administration's Blood Products Advisory Committee meeting in Gaithersburg, Maryland today. Issues such as the number of people that could be harboring vCJD as carriers, the impact on the blood supply and new risk reduction measures were addressed. Pall Corporation (NYSE: PLL) presented an overview of the latest research on its prion reduction technology as a new risk reduction measure to help prevent transfusion transmission of infectious prions that can cause vCJD. The Company expects to launch the new filter commercially in Europe this spring.

TSEs, also called prion diseases, are fatal neurodegenerative diseases that include vCJD in humans; bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle; chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer, elk and moose; and scrapie in sheep. These diseases are believed to be caused by prions, which are misfolded, or "rogue", infectious proteins.

"So much remains unknown about prion diseases even as new information comes to light practically daily. No one really knows how many people may be harboring vCJD without clinical symptoms and could potentially transmit the infection via blood transfusion," according to Joseph Cervia, MD, a leading infectious disease expert and medical director of Pall Corporation.

He outlined the myriad questions and uncertainties surrounding vCJD and other prion diseases. These include the length of the incubation period from time of exposure to the onset of symptoms; the number of people potentially harboring vCJD who are asymptomatic; the relationship to other neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's Disease; and whether other prion diseases, such as CWD found in elk and deer across the U.S., can also cross the species barrier to humans, as is the case with B
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Contact: Patricia Iannucci
piannucci@pall.com
516-801-9100
Pall Corporation
17-Mar-2005

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