A new twist in the CWD saga

[COEngineer]

A recent (not yet peer reviewed) paper linked below suggests transmission to a monkey from asymptomatic but CWS-infected deer muscle tissue equivalent to one 7 oz steak per month. If this were to be confirmed over several peer reviewed studies, this could be a game changer for many. Of course it could just end up in the waste basket of irreproducable scientific results.

Chronic Wasting Disease in Cervids: Implications for Prion Transmission to Humans and Other Animal Species

Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a prion-related transmissible spongiform encephalopathy of cervids, including deer, elk, reindeer, sika deer, and moose. CWD has been confirmed in at least 26 U.S. states, three Canadian provinces, South Korea, Finland, ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

This link is to an article, not a study, as far as I can tell. Most studies don't have sections titled "A Call To Action" with sentences like this: "A comprehensive strategy, with national leadership and support, is needed to address this important public health risk." Or is the study linked inside that link somewhere?

 

[BuzzH]

I agree with your thought process, but how do we know with complete certainty? People have died of unknown causes for ever. There are people who never go to doctors and their in home death is contributed to natural causes with no autopsy. And, as there are no recorded cases in humans, how would we know how it manifests itself and how it would effect every human? Hard to make a definitive "Not a single case of CWD jumping to humans". More accurately "not a single recorded" case, which means we really don't know.

Deductive reasoning...

 

[VikingsGuy]

nobody has been able to repeatably demonstrate how prions are supposed to replicate.

Heck they were arguing about this 30 years ago when I was in grad school. Seems fairly certain (and that is all science theories can be - see, 500 years of science history for “today’s fact” becoming “yesterday’s fallacy”) prions are an “infectious” agent where the protein itself causes related/associated proteins in the host to malform triggering a cascade. Definitely stretches the limits of our traditional definition of “pathogen” but seems largely reproducible for BSE and scrapie. While I can’t speak to a possible bacterial cause for CWD in deer - there are oft replicated studies of scrapie (believed by most to be a closely associated disease) in sheep that prove to the extent possible with modern technology that bacteria do not cause scrapie.

 

[VikingsGuy]

This link is to an article, not a study, as far as I can tell. Most studies don't have sections titled "A Call To Action" with sentences like this: "A comprehensive strategy, with national leadership and support, is needed to address this important public health risk." Or is the study linked inside that link somewhere?

Looks like what I would call a “survey paper” in pre-publication form. Fairly common in life sciences these days. Pulls together various other studies and draws generalized conclusions. Doesn’t appear to present new data of its own, but not all scientific papers do. No reason to purge your fridge, but also reasonably written “food” for thought (sorry for the pun). The other studies would be found by following the many footnotes.

 

[RockinU]

Heck they were arguing about this 30 years ago when I was in grad school. Seems fairly certain (and that is all science theories can be - see, 500 years of science history for “today’s fact” becoming “yesterday’s fallacy”) prions are an “infectious” agent where the protein itself causes related/associated proteins in the host to malform triggering a cascade. Definitely stretches the limits of our traditional definition of “pathogen” but seems largely reproducible for BSE and scrapie. While I can’t speak to a possible bacterial cause for CWD in deer - there are oft replicated studies of scrapie (believed by most to be a closely associated disease) in sheep that prove to the extent possible with modern technology that bacteria do not cause scrapie.

I don't know enough about it to argue one way or the other, but I can tell you that what I read is that some believe the prion to be a marker, or result of the disease and not the cause. Here is a link to an article I found that isn't from the LSU guy addressing some of this:

Yale professor refutes popular CWD theory

Deer hunters flooded my inbox last week asking if I had heard the great news that Dr. Frank Bastian has developed a cure for chronic wasting disease.

www.arkansasonline.com

 

[VikingsGuy]

I

I don't know enough about it to argue one way or the other, but I can tell you that what I read is that some believe the prion to be a marker, or result of the disease and not the cause. Here is a link to an article I found that isn't from the LSU guy addressing some of this:

Yale professor refutes popular CWD theory

Deer hunters flooded my inbox last week asking if I had heard the great news that Dr. Frank Bastian has developed a cure for chronic wasting disease.

www.arkansasonline.com

I don’t think anybody truly understands with 100% certainty how mammalian “prion related” diseases are caused, but I think incredibly unlikely bacterial treatable by tetracycline is the answer. Too many peer reviewed articles with scrapie that shows infectious nature of sample survives conditions far to stringent to allow bacterial survival.

 

[Ben Sellers]

I know a couple of people with dementia and that resembles CWD. Just getting a diagnosis on something as well know as that can be a long and difficult process. It’s conceivable that there have been human cases that were misdiagnosed as dementia or Alzheimer’s. How many Dr’s have CWD on their radar? As long as you haven’t eaten cows from England or human flesh, you wouldn’t necessarily trigger the screening for prion diseases. I don’t think human transmission is a common occurrence but it deserves a hard look.

 

[beginnerhunter]

I do hope testing gets easier and more available. I wouldn't knowingly eat meat from a CWD animal but it's still a hurdle to get it tested around here. And I use a processor so who knows what I'm really getting anyway.

I know a couple of people with dementia and that resembles CWD. Just getting a diagnosis on something as well know as that can be a long and difficult process. It’s conceivable that there have been human cases that were misdiagnosed as dementia or Alzheimer’s. How many Dr’s have CWD on their radar? As long as you haven’t eaten cows from England or human flesh, you wouldn’t necessarily trigger the screening for prion diseases. I don’t think human transmission is a common occurrence but it deserves a hard look.

I've wondered that as well. But you would think dementia and alzheimers rates would be statistically higher in the hardcore CWD regions. And I don't think that has been demonstrated either, as far as I know.

 

[Sytes]

I've heard those who wrench on others who may be concerned over eating meat with cwd and those who are convinced cwd is one of Revelation's horsemen.

I'm not touching known cwd meat. I look forward to a field testing kit at a reasonable price. Until then... And who knows when that will be, I'll be visually picky w/ the trigger pull or release... Means squat and with the potential breakout in NW MT, I may simply pass until that test kit becomes reality - 10 years down the road. Think I may be swapping deer for pronghorn, unless the rack makes it worth the shot.

 

[BuzzH]

I do hope testing gets easier and more available. I wouldn't knowingly eat meat from a CWD animal but it's still a hurdle to get it tested around here. And I use a processor so who knows what I'm really getting anyway.

I've wondered that as well. But you would think dementia and alzheimers rates would be statistically higher in the hardcore CWD regions. And I don't think that has been demonstrated either, as far as I know.

I think if you use a processor in a known CWD area, you're at an even higher risk of being exposed to prions from cross contamination.

 

[88man]

I think if you use a processor in a known CWD area, you're at an even higher risk of being exposed to prions from cross contamination.

OMG yes I just can't believe people do!

 

[88man]

50 years and we still don't have a handle on this. We don't know if the prion is the result or the cause? It has to tell us something that there are no human hotspot issues in Northern Colorado or Southern Wyoming or in any of the other areas of high infection.
Dementia/MS/Parkinsons/Alzheimers diagnosis keep increasing the past 30 years. Why?? I am not suggesting!
Its scary to me as it certainly has the ability to change hunting and game management more than we can imagine.

 

[hossblur]

Am I the only one who has a minor brain and asks why we still allow deer/elk farms?

We don't know muxh about cwd, but we do know where it spread from, and that it's a reservoir for it.

 

[3855WIN]

Wasn't there a professor at LSU that said a little while back that he had cracked the code on CWD? What happened with that?

I went to the meat eater podcast in Dallas in February and they asked the audience how many would eat a deer that tested positive for CWD, and I was shocked at the number of affirmative responses....but maybe I'm just a sissy or something.

I believe LSU disassociated themselves from him. He’s not being taken too seriously at this point.

 

[Lost Arra]

Testing methods need to improve in reliability, speed in obtaining results and ease of testing. If I'm fortunate enough to kill an elk this fall I may have it tested just for the experience but a positive result could get complicated. I'm pretty sure I saw a CWD cow last season. She was begging me to send her an arrow.

 

[jmveverka]

Count me in the camp of those that can't stand it when other hunters are telling people, advocating for, or making definitive statements about not eating meat in a CWD area. In every platform, media and R3 initiative across the country the primary focus is hunting for food. Then you have high profile individuals in the hunting media saying not to eat the meat. Which is it?

CWD is present at least to some extent in half the states in the country. Telling people to not eat meat is equivalent to saying don't hunt, or at least don't hunt in Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania or any of the 24 states and 277 counties with reported CWD. There is no evidence it passes to humans - stop perpetuating a fear that can only have the impact of reducing hunter numbers. Please do advocate for testing to help biologists in tracking the disease, but stop the fear mongering about food.

 

[VikingsGuy]

Count me in the camp of those that can't stand it when other hunters are telling people, advocating for, or making definitive statements about not eating meat in a CWD area. In every platform, media and R3 initiative across the country the primary focus is hunting for food. Then you have high profile individuals in the hunting media saying not to eat the meat. Which is it?

CWD is present at least to some extent in half the states in the country. Telling people to not eat meat is equivalent to saying don't hunt, or at least don't hunt in Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania or any of the 24 states and 277 counties with reported CWD. There is no evidence it passes to humans - stop perpetuating a fear that can only have the impact of reducing hunter numbers. Please do advocate for testing to help biologists in tracking the disease, but stop the fear mongering about food.

Being curious, asking questions, sharing perspectives and information and discussing differing views is not fear mongering. I have no idea where the truth on this will end up, but no reason to ban discussion and inquiry. As already stated, I’m still hunting and still eating game - but I am also interested in where this goes and welcome friendly discussion.

 

[Tiredofthebickering]

Count me in the camp of those that can't stand it when other hunters are telling people, advocating for, or making definitive statements about not eating meat in a CWD area. In every platform, media and R3 initiative across the country the primary focus is hunting for food. Then you have high profile individuals in the hunting media saying not to eat the meat. Which is it?

CWD is present at least to some extent in half the states in the country. Telling people to not eat meat is equivalent to saying don't hunt, or at least don't hunt in Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania or any of the 24 states and 277 counties with reported CWD. There is no evidence it passes to humans - stop perpetuating a fear that can only have the impact of reducing hunter numbers. Please do advocate for testing to help biologists in tracking the disease, but stop the fear mongering about food.

Maybe that's the goal??

 

[jmveverka]

Being curious, asking questions, sharing perspectives and information and discussing differing views is not fear mongering. I have no idea where the truth on this will end up, but no reason to ban discussion and inquiry. As already stated, I’m still hunting and still eating game - but I am also interested in where this goes and welcome friendly discussion.

I agree, ask the questions, discuss and keep informed. But when a panel on the Meateater Podcast goes around the room and asks the question "would you eat it" and the answer from all of the influential hunters on stage is "No", "Hell no", and other unequivocal negative responses, where does that leave their targeted recruitment base of adult onset hunters interested in food... I guess it leaves them eating squirrels.

 

[jmveverka]

I guess it leaves them eating squirrels.

Sorry, not a knock on squirrels, just tough to feed a family on squirrels alone for the year.