Deadly ?zombie? deer disease could possibly spread to humans, experts warn

[Not_A_Llama]

Not CWD. That'd be like a bunch of people with Alzheimer's dying all of a sudden. It can happen, just not from the disease (nursing home bus flying off a cliff).

Prions are weird shit. Not viral, nothing to do with DNA. Cooking doesn't help. Think of it sorta like those reusable heatpacks they used to sell, with the metal disc inside. Or supercooled water videos on youtube. Kick it off and it spreads. A single screwed-up version of "stuff" ends up corrupting the rest. Crystals in solution for the hot packs/ice, prions in protein for critters.

Once a protein has been transformed (folded) into a prion form, there's no going back. It's like trying to uncook an egg.

The thing that unsettles me is that Prions are now demonstrated to be persistent in soil and vegetation for YEARS (infectious after 26 months buried, in one study), long after any animals have been present. You could wipe out every deer and elk today, reintroduce in X years, and it could come back from them grazing in previously-infected areas.

Monkey and transgenic mouse models are mixed on transmission from consumption. I've chatted with some epidemiologist types - I get the feel that most think it's out there in people, but it's infrequent/slow/not particularly disease-causing, or is misdiagnosed as other TSEs and dementias. Keep in mind that 10% of people get alzheimer's, and by age 90, something like 40% of people will have some sort of dementia, and given the lack of cures and lack of concern with the elderly, almost nobody gets additional screening like Amyloid plaque scanning. We'd just never know.

Personally? Don't take the weird deer. I avoid CNS material. I won't feed to kids. I'll feed to dogs and myself, as I'm older and if it does cause disease in people, it probably wouldn't take hold of me before my time is up anyway (the Fukushima retiree approach)