Cannibalism Study May Hold Clues for Mad-Cow Disease

[Celebration]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000102&sid=aGRpJCkEsUf8&refer=uk

June 23 (Bloomberg) -- A study of an epidemic caused by cannibalism indicates the human form of mad-cow disease may incubate for more than 50 years before developing into the fatal illness, researchers said in a medical journal.

The findings suggest the eventual size of a variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease epidemic may be much bigger than previously thought, U.K. researchers including John Collinge of the University College London wrote in this week's The Lancet.

Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy, or mad-cow disease, was first found in the U.K. in 1986. Humans catch the disease through meat from cattle that have eaten feed mixed with ground-up parts of infected animals. About 160 U.K. residents have been diagnosed with the disease, with cases also reported in the U.S. and Japan.

``A human BSE epidemic may be multiphasic,'' Collinge said in The Lancet. ``Recent estimates of the size of the variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease epidemic based on uniform genetic susceptibility could be substantial underestimations.''

[Eurobabe]

1. Hell in 50 yrs. I'll be dead

not to worry, we all have mad cow if we've eaten US beef in our lifetime. The question is when will it strike?

Any coinkydink with rise in Alzheimer's?

[varkam]

2. I wonder....

...if it's that prions (the organisms that cause BSE) actually incubate for up to 50 years, or if it simply takes that long for symptoms to become apparent. The reason I wonder that is because the brain is an extremely robust and plastic organ. From what I understand, prions essentially chew through brain tissue and leave it resembling a sponge (hence the name spongiform). If memory serves, Parkinson's involves a degeneration of neurons along the Nigro-Striatal pathway in the brain (involved in movement), but symptoms of Parkinson's don't become apparent until approximately 90% of those neurons are dead. Could it be that prions are already hard at work, but it just takes so long for them to have a discernible effect?

Aside from that, prions are bad news. Once they invade your central nervous system, there is no way to kill them. Not even heat kills them. One of the things that's freaky, though, is that there was a recent story in my local paper about a deer being found with prions in it's muscle tissue (i.e. Outside of the CNS - which could potentially be very bad news).

[BrklynLiberal]

3. I guess Mother Nature does not like it when mankind makes cannibals

out of herbivores.