[MD] dualism

[Dan Glover]

>From: "ian glendinning" <psybertron at gmail.com>
>Reply-To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
>To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
>Subject: Re: [MD] dualism
>Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2007 17:04:14 -0600
>
>Dan, you said
>"Here a good percentage (well over half) of deer are infected with prion
>disease (mad cow) ..."
>
>Huh ? what ? how ?
>I sincerely doubt it. I'm hard pushed to think of any possible mechanism.
>Do you have any evidence or reference to that remark ?
>(Or are we just talking the generic concept of a prion disease, and if
>so in what sense are we using the word "infected" ?)

Hi Ian

You may (or may not) know that "mad cow" disease (bovine spongiform 
encephalopathy) and the human variant (Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease) are both 
(possibly) related to chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk. These 
as a group are known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathy. It is 
speculated that these diseases are the result of an infectious agent made of 
mis-folded protein or a prion (short for proteinaceous infectious particle).

This came from a study done in 2002:

"Wildlife disease experts concluded that in the absence of management 
intervention, CWD will most likely increase in prevalence and distribution. 
There is no evidence that CWD will "burn itself out" if left alone. Further 
there is no evidence of genetic resistance to CWD in white-tailed deer or 
mule deer. A simulation model suggests that if left unmanaged CWD will 
spread widely throughout Wisconsin and will substantially increase in 
prevalence to more than 40 percent of adult deer. The model simulations are 
consistent with recent findings from Colorado that have shown increases in 
prevalence over the past few years in numerous local populations. Prevalence 
on some of their local winter ranges now exceeds 25-30 percent. To put this 
in perspective, in some sections of Wisconsin’s core area prevalence is as 
high as 8-12 percent. In addition, the known affected area in both Colorado 
and Wyoming has expanded to the west and northwest more than 100 miles 
during the past five years."

Since then the situation has (supposedly) grown progressively worse. The 
disease appears to be spread by animal to animal contact via saliva and 
other bodily fluids.

I don't eat deer or elk meat so I have no worries but when I saw SA mention 
he planned on harvesting some meat I just threw it out there. Actually I've 
read some newspaper articles recently that claimed the "over 50%" figure I 
gave but that may or may not be correct. I'm not sure any definitive studies 
have been done on the wild deer and elk population.

Better safe than sorry though, right? For more information just Google prion 
or chronic wasting disease and you'll find much info.

Thank you for your comments,

Dan