Study: Hunters Die After Consuming CWD-Infected Venison

[Robert N]

Not good.

Study: Hunters Die After Consuming CWD-Infected Venison

If one eats infected venison, well, by definition the act of burning calories to eat means one is alive…and it’s a guarantee that we are all going to die one day.

So, well, yeah. Technically speaking, this is 100% true.

Causation however is at best questionable.

 

[Cmf88]

People have been eating cwd infected deer unknowingly for years Imo, sounds like another scare tactic to me.

 

[WesternWyoming]

A good friend from northern Wyoming died from Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease after eating CWD-infected venison. It's a horrible way to die. Because I live where CWD is present in the mule deer population, I see no reason not to get my deer tested by the G&F before consuming. It needs to hang at least a week anyway: about the time it takes to get the test results back.

 

[grizzly_]

It would be nice if every state offered an easy way to have your animals tested prior to consumption.

My neighbor died of CJD several years ago. One day she was golfing and started having strange symptoms that her friends thought were symptoms of a stroke. Some diagnostic tests later and they identified it as CJD. She only lived a short time after that.

I shot an elk a while back that had some abnormalities that my hunting partner, a physician, felt strongly could be CWD. We were concerned enough that we left the antlers attached to the body because I didn't want to cut the brain or neck, though we did take the meat. I sent the state game agency (which will remain unnamed) some pictures of the carcass and they called immediately and hiked into the elk to retrieve the carcass.

I never heard back on the results, which I assume means good news, and I never saw a positive CWD report on their media page, so I hope I'm in the clear.

I'm a little bit uneasy about CWD and try and take reasonable precautions.

 

[Hilljackoutlaw]

I feel that in 57 years we would of have more concrete evidence that this could happen. The fact we don't have any makes me very skeptical that it jumps from cervids to humans.

 

[grizzly_]

There is some concern among researchers due to clusters of CJD in areas of CWD. This includes hunting partners that died of CJD within a short time of each other. It could be coincidence, but they're not sure.

https://www.neurology.org/doi/10.1212/WNL.0000000000204407

 

[sapperJ24]

I feel that in 57 years we would of have more concrete evidence that this could happen. The fact we don't have any makes me very skeptical that it jumps from cervids to humans.

Conversely, there's a lot that has to happen for the jump to be confirmed in humans.

CWD needs to become widespread enough to be encountered at some rate across the landscape; hunters need to harvest and eat infected but asymptomatic animals; people consume infected brain or spinal cord; meat (muscle tissue) needs to be contaminated with infected brain/spinal/lymph material or have a high prion load (unknown if the latter is possible); people then need to contract CJD and it needs to be tested for; and, finally, CJD cases need to be reported even though the CDC doesn't currently mandate reporting.

It is quite difficult to prove the positive (cervid CWD to human CJD) here. Hunters that are hesitant to follow CWD recommendations are probably unlikely to test their animals and so positive confirmation of CWD contaminated meat consumption is unlikely. And it would be pretty unethical to intentionally expose some people to CWD meat to see if uptake is possible.

I wouldn't rule out transmission as possible, and I agree that ongoing surveillance needs to be conducted.

 

[Ben Long]

National Deer Assoc and biologists like Heffelfinger are casting skeptical shade on this report.

NDA Urges Deer Hunters to Consider New CWD Report With Caution

A new report is causing undue alarm about human health and CWD. Here is NDA's response to the situation.

deerassociation.com

BL

 

[thomas89]

I've heard it's a horrific way to go/see someone go. Sad for the loved ones. Recall reading a SF soldier went from tip of the spear to getting kicked out of the Army, presumably from vCJD acquired eating sheep brains (IIRC) while assimilating with a local populace in some foreign country.

The other part of me says at 70+, lots of worse ways to drag out death than a month after onset of symptoms.

I'll keep doing what I'm doing, testing and sanitizing.

 

[Bigjay73]

I know more than a few hunters who died and had eaten salads in the months leading up to their deaths. Coincidence????? I think not

 

[ElkHunter80]

Does the CWD test on game still have to be a brain tissue sample or has it expanded to other tissues?

 

[kwyeewyk]

Does the CWD test on game still have to be a brain tissue sample or has it expanded to other tissues?

Lymph node usually.

 

[ElkHunter80]

Lymph node usually.

Thanks. I'm sure there is guidance in the reg book - just never was excited about packing out a whole cow elk head for a brain sample but I'd do what I need to do.

 

[TOGIE]

so, roughly first found cwd in the wild in 1981. given incubation periods you'd think we'd have already long started seeing some very obviously standout and suspicious clumps of cjd amongst folks in or who hunted in wyoming and colorado throughout the 90's by now.

that doesn't seem to happening.

 

[TheBenHoyle]

I won't eat venison that comes from an animal that hasn't been tested. I just wish it was easier to get the tests done in a timely manner. Here in Illinois they do testing, but the whole testing regime is designed to be a source of data for the biologists and the hunter's interest in the safety of the meat takes a very distant second place. Perhaps with more public pressure for these tests they will invest in a better testing and reporting system.

 

[Nick87]

I won't eat venison that comes from an animal that hasn't been tested. I just wish it was easier to get the tests done in a timely manner. Here in Illinois they do testing, but the whole testing regime is designed to be a source of data for the biologists and the hunter's interest in the safety of the meat takes a very distant second place. Perhaps with more public pressure for these tests they will invest in a better testing and reporting system.

The Public in cwd areas doesn't even want the testing we have. Crying about having to take it to get it tested and not knowing how to cape out a deer they want mounted to be tested.

 

[Gellar]

Jim Heffelfinger

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[Weimer]

Seems like they’re assuming a lot of things.

 

[Gulf of America]

My grandma died of CJD in Dillon about 10 years ago. Her Dr. at the time told my mom that he would never say it out loud in town, but he thought there was a hot spot of CJD in the area that had to be related to CWD. However, I haven't been able to find any data actually indicating a higher-than-average incidence of CJD in Dillon. She was in her mid-70's and lived for about 6 months after onset of symptoms. Variant CJD cases in people who consumed mad cow-infected beef were generally younger with an incubation period of about 10 years after exposure, so I tend to think her case was genuinely spontaneous (she ate game meat, but not much the last 20 years of life) and I would lean towards the same with the men in this case. That being said, every manner of dying is a summation of risk over time - my hypothesis is that some people are perhaps more genetically predisposed to acquire prion infections, and every exposure to CWD-infected meat would increase the risk of developing CJD. Some will eat very little and develop CJD, some will eat a ton and not develop it, some will die another way who would have eventually developed it. I'll continue to test my game as much as I'm able, but I'm not going to turn down dinner with friends who haven't.

 

[cur dog]

Not good.

Study: Hunters Die After Consuming CWD-Infected Venison

Obviously, there are a lot of assumptions and many questions that remain.

Personally I would never feed an untested Wyoming mule deer to my family.