Monday, July 31, 2023

Field Dressing a Deer (or any Cervid), Tools Used (for instance knives with wooden handles), Carcass Tissues etc, Disposal, and CWD, what if?

Field Dressing a Deer (or any Cervid), Tools Used (for instance knives with wooden handles), Carcass Tissues etc, Disposal, and CWD, what if?


Second lab worker with deadly prion disease prompts research pause in France A lab worker died of prion disease in 2019, nine years after a lab accident.

BETH MOLE - 7/29/2021, 5:16 PM

Five public research institutions in France announced a three-month moratorium on prion research this week, following a newly identified case of prion disease in a retired lab worker.

If the case is found to be linked to a laboratory exposure, it would be the second such case identified in France. In 2019, another lab worker in the country died of a prion disease at the age of 33. Her death came around nine years after she accidentally jabbed herself in the thumb with forceps used to handle frozen slices of humanized mouse brains infected with prions.

Prions and disease

snip...

Émilie Jaumain

Importantly, the classic and variant forms of CJD have distinct clinical and pathological features. For one thing, classic CJD tends to afflict older adults (median age of death is 68), while the variant form tends to strike earlier (median age at death is 28). Classic CJD may start with memory problems and confusion, while variant CJD may start with psychiatric symptoms and painful nerve damage.

Variant CJD was the clear cause of the 2019 prion disease in the young lab worker, named Émilie Jaumain. In May of 2010, a 24-year-old Jaumain was working in a prion lab in France's National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE) when she tragically stabbed her thumb, piercing through a double-layer of latex gloves and drawing blood. "Émilie started worrying about the accident as soon as it had happened, and mentioned it to every doctor she saw," her widower, Armel Houel, told Science Magazine.

According to a case report of her disease and death published in the New England Journal of Medicine last year, Jaumain first developed symptoms in November 2017, about 7.5 years after the accident. The symptoms started as burning pain in her right shoulder and neck, which worsened and spread to the right half of her body over the next six months. In January 2019, she became depressed and anxious and had memory impairment and visual hallucinations. The muscles on the right side of her body stiffened. According to an association set up in Jaumain's name to promote lab safety, she was diagnosed with variant CJD in April 2019, and, before her death in June, lost the ability to move and speak. Postmortem analysis included in the NEJM case report confirmed the diagnosis of variant CJD.

Researchers cannot entirely rule out the possibility that Jaumain developed variant CJD after eating contaminated meat. However, the authors of the NEJM report noted that the last similar case of variant CJD in France died in 2014. The authors concluded that the risk of developing variant CJD in France in 2019 was "negligible or nonexistent."

Lab safety

The authors also note that the occupational cases of variant CJD are not unheard of. "The last known Italian patient with variant CJD, who died in 2016, had had occupational contact with BSE-infected brain tissues, although subsequent investigation did not disclose a laboratory accident," the authors wrote.

So far, little is known about the new case in France that prompted the moratorium this week. In a joint statement announcing the moratorium, the research institutions said that it was not yet known if the retired researcher, who also worked at the INRAE, had variant or classic CJD.

"The suspension period put in place as of this day will make it possible to study the possibility of a link between the observed case and the person's former professional activity and to adapt, if necessary, the preventive measures in force in the research laboratories," the joint statement, released Tuesday, reads.

According to reporting by Science magazine, Jaumain's family has filed both criminal charges and an administrative lawsuit against the INRAE. The family's lawyer told the magazine that she had not been properly trained to safely handle dangerous prions, did not wear metal mesh or surgical gloves, and did not immediately soak the thumb in bleach, which the lawyer said should have been done.

Prion decontamination is notoriously difficult. The World Health Organization recommends decontaminating waste materials by soaking them in a high concentration of bleach for an hour, then putting them in an autoclave (a steam- and pressure-based sterilization machine) at or above 121° Celsius (~250° Fahrenheit) for an hour. That said, for skin punctures, the WHO suggests people should "gently encourage bleeding" and wash the wound with soap and water.

French investigators identified 17 other lab accidents involving prions in the past decade in the country, five of which involved cuts or stabs, Science noted. Some labs have said they had improved safety in light of Jaumain’s death, such as by using plastic tools that are less sharp than metal ones and using cut-resistant gloves.

Variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob Disease Diagnosed 7.5 Years after Occupational Exposure

July 2, 2020 N Engl J Med 2020; 383:83-85 DOI: 10.1056/NEJMc2000687

In May 2010, when the patient was 24 years of age, she worked in a prion research laboratory, where she handled frozen sections of brain of transgenic mice that overexpressed the human prion protein with methionine at codon 129. The mice had been infected with a sheep-adapted form of BSE. During this process, she stabbed her thumb through a double pair of latex gloves with the sharp ends of a curved forceps used to handle the samples. Bleeding was noted at the puncture site.


Appendix Case Study 





See full text…


all iatrogenic cjd is, is sporadic cjd, before the iatrogenic event is discovered, traced back, proven, documented, put into the academic domain, and then finally the public domain, this very seldom happens, thus problem solved, it's all sporadic cjd. ...terry

least we forget...

Transmission of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease to a chimpanzee by electrodes contaminated during neurosurgery

Gibbs CJ Jr, Asher DM, Kobrine A, Amyx HL, Sulima MP, Gajdusek DC. 

Laboratory of Central Nervous System Studies, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892. 

Stereotactic multicontact electrodes used to probe the cerebral cortex of a middle aged woman with progressive dementia were previously implicated in the accidental transmission of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) to two younger patients. The diagnoses of CJD have been confirmed for all three cases. More than two years after their last use in humans, after three cleanings and repeated sterilisation in ethanol and formaldehyde vapour, the electrodes were implanted in the cortex of a chimpanzee. Eighteen months later the animal became ill with CJD. This finding serves to re-emphasise the potential danger posed by reuse of instruments contaminated with the agents of spongiform encephalopathies, even after scrupulous attempts to clean them. 



New studies on the heat resistance of hamster-adapted scrapie agent: Threshold survival after ashing at 600°C suggests an inorganic template of replication


Prion Infected Meat-and-Bone Meal Is Still Infectious after Biodiesel Production


Detection of protease-resistant cervid prion protein in water from a CWD-endemic area


A Quantitative Assessment of the Amount of Prion Diverted to Category 1 Materials and Wastewater During Processing


Rapid assessment of bovine spongiform encephalopathy prion inactivation by heat treatment in yellow grease produced in the industrial manufacturing process of meat and bone meals


THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2019

BSE infectivity survives burial for five years with only limited spread 


Do not use household knives or other kitchen utensils for field dressing.


Inactivation of chronic wasting disease prions using sodium hypochlorite 

Katie WilliamsID, Andrew G. Hughson, Bruce Chesebro, Brent Race* Laboratory of Persistent Viral Diseases, Rocky Mountain Laboratories, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Hamilton, Montana, United States of America 

Abstract 

Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a fatal prion disease that can infect deer, elk and moose. CWD has now been detected in 26 states of the USA, 3 Canadian provinces, South Korea, Norway, Sweden and Finland. CWD continues to spread from endemic areas, and new foci of infections are frequently detected. As increasing numbers of cervids become infected, the likelihood for human exposure increases. To date, no cases of CWD infection in humans have been confirmed, but experience with the BSE zoonosis in the United Kingdom sug- gests exposure to CWD should be minimized. Specifically, hunters, meat processors and others in contact with tissues from potentially CWD-infected cervids need a practical method to decontaminate knives, saws and other equipment. Prions are notoriously difficult to inacti- vate, and most effective methods require chemicals or sterilization processes that are either dangerous, caustic, expensive or not readily available. Although corrosive, sodium hypo- chlorite (bleach) is widely available and affordable and has been shown to inactivate prion agents including those that cause scrapie, bovine spongiform encephalopathy and Creutz- feldt-Jakob disease. In the current study, we confirm that bleach is an effective disinfectant for CWD prions and establish minimum times and bleach concentrations to eliminate prion seeding activity from stainless steel and infected brain homogenate solutions. We found that a five-minute treatment with a 40% dilution of household bleach was effective at inacti- vating CWD seeding activity from stainless-steel wires and CWD-infected brain homoge- nates. However, bleach was not able to inactivate CWD seeding activity from solid tissues in our studies.


What precautions should hunters take?

Since it’s not always apparent that a deer may be carrying a disease, hunters should take simple precautions such as wearing latex gloves when field dressing carcasses and washing hands and instruments thoroughly. Instruments should be disinfected with a 2% chlorine bleach solution (3 parts water to 2 parts household bleach) and rinsed with water after field dressing or butchering is complete. Another precautionary recommendation is to avoid sawing through bones and avoid the lymphatic and neurological tissue (i.e., lymph nodes, brain, and spine). Also, see TPWD publication Common Sense Precautions for Handling and Processing Deer (PWD LF W7000-859) for more information about processing deer. Finally, when taking deer to a game processor, hunters may consider requesting their animals be processed individually, without meat from other animals being added to meat from your animal.


Common Sense Precautions

FOR HANDLING AND PROCESSING DEER

Common sense precautions while handling and processing deer should be taken at all times. Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is one of many diseases that can affect deer. CWD is a fatal transmissible neurological disease that affects cervid species such as white-tailed deer, mule deer, elk, red deer and sika. It is classified as a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, a family of diseases that includes scrapie (found in sheep) and Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE; found in cattle). Much remains unknown about this disease.

The peculiarities of its transmission, infection rate, incubation period, and potential for transmission to other species are still being investigated. What is known is that CWD is invariably fatal, and can be passed directly from deer to deer and indirectly through environmental contamination. Scientists believe CWD is caused by a misfolded protein (“prion”) that replicates and infects other normal proteins. Prions generally concentrate in the brain, spinal cord, eyes, lymph nodes and spleen, and they are shed in saliva, urine, blood, soft-antler material, feces, and from decomposition of an infected animal. There is no scientific evidence that chronic wasting disease can infect humans or domestic livestock.

General Precaution Field Dressing Cutting and Processing Do not shoot or eat any part of a deer that appears sick. If hunting within a CWD Zone, please accurately document the location of any deer that appears sick and contact a TPWD office or call TPWD headquarters in Austin toll-free at (800) 792-1112 and enter 5 for wildlife and 1 for general wildlife information. Or contact TAHC tollfree at (800) 550-8242. Wear rubber or latex gloves.

All internal organs and inedible carcass parts should be left at the site of harvest. Clean processing knives and equipment of residue and disinfect with a 50/50 solution of household chlorine bleach and water. Wipe down counters and let them dry; soak knives for one hour.

Wear rubber or latex gloves.

If removing antlers, soak the blade of the saw used in a bleach solution for one hour. No deer/elk carcass parts or carcasses can enter Texas from a state or country know to have CWD, and no deer elk carcasses or part of carcasses can be transport out of a CWD Zone in the Trans Pecos or Panhandle. Explanations and exemptions to importation restrictions can be found at tpwd.texas.gov/cwd

Inedible parts should be left at the site of harvest, or disposed of in a landfill. Hunters should note that a deer may not be processed beyond quarters until it reaches the final destination. Once at the final destination for the meat, bone out the meat from the deer and remove all fat and connective tissue (the web-like membranes attached to the meat). This will also remove lymph nodes.

Thoroughly clean and sanitize equipment and work areas with bleach solution after processing.

What parts can I use?

There are some parts of the deer you should never eat, even if the animal looks healthy. The parts listed below are tissues where prions generally concentrate. Normal field dressing and trimming fat from meat will remove lymph nodes and other parts that accumulate prions. The diagram shows some main locations of lymph nodes and other tissues where prions concentrate.

Never eat meat from a deer that looks sick. Never eat a deer’s:

• Brain

• Eyeballs

• Spinal cord

• Spleen

• Lymph nodes

To be sure you’ve removed all of the parts listed above:

• Gut and skin the deer

• Cut meat from the bone with a knife; don’t cut through bones

• Remove all fat, membranes and tendons from the meat

• Remove the head

© Texas Parks and Wildlife Department PWD LF W7000-859 (11/16)

Clinical symptoms/signs of sick deer

Please note that many diseases in deer cause many of the same symptoms as CWD, and not all symptoms/signs of CWD will occur in all cases.

Loss of fear of humans

Nervousness or high excitability

Teeth-grinding

Loss of coordination

Notable weakness

Inability to stand

Rough dull haircoat

Excessive salivation

Drooping of the head and ears

Excessive thirst

Difficulty swallowing

Severe emaciation and dehydration

Report sick deer, especially those within a CWD zone to a TPWD Game Warden or Wildlife Biologist. For additional information contact Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

www.tpwd.texas.gov


Terry S. Singeltary Sr.

posted by Terry S. Singeltary Sr. at 11:04 AM

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