CWD DETECTED IN ELK HUNT AREA 117 SOUTH OF SUNDANCE WYOMING

CWD DETECTED IN ELK HUNT AREA 117 SOUTH OF SUNDANCE

12/2/2008

CASPER-- Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) has been discovered for the first time in elk hunt area 117 south of Sundance.

The Wyoming Game and Fish Department Laboratory analyzed a sample from a targeted cow elk from hunt area 117 and the sample tested positive for CWD. The elk was found at Solider Creek, just east of Highway 85 about 5 miles west of the South Dakota border. Elk hunt area 117 has been considered part of the endemic area for deer (hunt area 6) since 2003. "This area has long been positive for deer and we just now found a positive elk in this area," said Hank Edwards, wildlife disease specialist for the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

The department recommends that hunters taking elk or deer in this area transport only the following items: cut and wrapped meat, boned meat, animal quarters or other pieces with no portion of the spinal column or head attached, hides without the head, cleaned skull plates (no meat or nervous tissue attached), antlers with no meat or other tissue attached. The head, spine, and other nervous tissue should be left at the site of the kill or disposed of in an approved landfill. Rubber or latex gloves should be worn when field dressing any animal and during butchering.

CWD has been diagnosed in some wild deer, elk, and moose in 10 states and two Canadian provinces. After a review of available scientific data, the World Health Organization in December 1999 stated, "There is currently no evidence that CWD in cervidae (deer and elk) is transmitted to humans." In 2004, Dr. Ermias Belay of the Center for Disease Control said, "The lack of evidence of a link between CWD transmission and unusual cases of CJD, (Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a human prion disease) despite several epidemiological investigations, suggest that the risk, if any, of transmission of CWD to humans is low." Nonetheless to avoid risk, both organizations say parts or products from any animal that looks sick and/or tests positive for CWD should not be eaten.

For more information on chronic wasting disease visit the Game and Fish Web site at: .

-WGFD-

http://gf.state.wy.us/services/news/pressreleases/08/12/02/081202_1.asp


0C7.04

North American Cervids Harbor Two Distinct CWD Strains

Authors

Angers, R. Seward, T, Napier, D., Browning, S., Miller, M., Balachandran A., McKenzie, D., Hoover, E., Telling, G. 'University of Kentucky; Colorado Division of Wildlife, Canadian Food Inspection Agency; University Of Wisconsin; Colorado State University.

Content

Despite the increasing geographic distribution and host range of CWD, little is known about the prion strain(s) responsible for distinct outbreaks of the disease. To address this we inoculated CWD-susceptible Tg(CerPrP)1536+/· mice with 29 individual prion samples from various geographic locations in North America. Upon serial passage, intrastudy incubation periods consistently diverged and clustered into two main groups with means around 210 and 290 days, with corresponding differences in neuropathology. Prion strain designations were utilized to distinguish between the two groups: Type I CWD mice succumbed to disease in the 200 day range and displayed a symmetrical pattern of vacuolation and PrPSc deposition, whereas Type II CWD mice succumbed to disease near 300 days and displayed a strikingly different pattern characterized by large local accumulations of florid plaques distributed asymmetrically. Type II CWD bears a striking resemblance to unstable parental scrapie strains such as 87A which give rise to stable, short incubation period strains such as ME7 under certain passage conditions. In agreement, the only groups of CWD-inoculated mice with unwavering incubation periods were those with Type I CWD. Additionally, following endpoint titration of a CWD sample, Type I CWD could be recovered only at the lowest dilution tested (10-1), whereas Type II CWD was detected in mice inoculated with all dilutions resulting in disease. Although strain properties are believed to be encoded in the tertiary structure of the infectious prion protein, we found no biochemical differences between Type I and Type II CWD. Our data confirm the co·existence of two distinct prion strains in CWD-infected cervids and suggest that Type II CWD is the parent strain of Type I CWD.

see page 29, and see other CWD studies ;

http://www.neuroprion.org/resources/pdf_docs/conferences/prion2008/abstract-book-prion2008.pdf


Sunday, November 23, 2008

PRION October 8th - 10th 2008 Book of Abstracts

http://bse-atypical.blogspot.com/2008/11/prion-october-8th-10th-2008-book-of.html


Saturday, September 06, 2008

Chronic wasting disease in a Wisconsin white-tailed deer farm 79% INFECTION RATE

Contents: September 1 2008, Volume 20, Issue 5

snip...see full text ;

http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2008/11/commentary-crimes-hurt-essence-of.html


Wednesday, December 17, 2008 White-tailed Deer in Portage County Tests Positive for CWD

http://chronic-wasting-disease.blogspot.com/2008/12/white-tailed-deer-in-portage-county.html


TSS