Infectious CWD prions found in deer meat

[Tupenator]

This is going to start a new uprising regarding limitations that states have imposed on the importation of wild game from out of state. Here in California, you can 'legally' only bring in boned out meat. No portion of the spine, brain and any bone (except for a boiled skull plate) is allowed.

I was told that last year outside of Truckee, Ca., they had a check station that caught many hunters off guard. They were given the choice of boning out their meat right there along side the road or discarding the animal all together in a special DFG dumpster. Along with that, they were also cited. (This is second hand info. Don't shoot the messenger if it's not true )

Now with this news, are they going to ban wild game all together? Will they lift the ban on the spine, brain and bones?

Only time will tell.....



This is directly from the Denver Post
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_3442034

Research finds the matter, which causes chronic wasting disease, in muscle. It had been thought to be only in nervous-system tissue.

By Katy Human
Denver Post Staff Writer


A person who eats venison could swallow the proteins shown to cause a deadly brain disease in deer, elk and moose, researchers reported today.

Their article in the journal Science represents the first time scientists have found the proteins that cause the affliction, chronic wasting disease, in the meat and muscle of deer.
Previously, it had been found only in the brain, spinal and lymph tissues. Health officials have long reassured hunters they would not be exposed to the disease as long as they did not touch or eat those parts.

A Colorado expert on the disease said the discovery doesn't necessarily mean that Colorado hunters should change their practices or that venison eaters should change their habits.
There's still no evidence that a person has caught a brain disease by eating a sick deer, said the expert, Mike Miller, a veterinarian with the Colorado Division of Wildlife.

In the Science article, Colorado and Kentucky scientists said they had found "significant" amounts of disease-causing prion proteins in the hamstring muscle of deer dying from chronic wasting disease.

When injected into laboratory mouse brains, the muscle tissue caused wasting disease.

"People who are handling or consuming deer meat are going to be at risk to consuming prions," said Glenn Telling, a molecular biologist at the University of Kentucky and co-author of the study.

Scientists still don't know whether the deer prions can sicken people, Telling said, but the finding "raises the stakes."
Prions that cause a similar disease - mad cow - have never been found in cow muscle tissue.

Even so, a few people who ate mad-cow-infected beef have caught and died of a deadly brain disease, called variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob.

"People are more likely to run a risk of exposure to chronic wasting disease proteins" through deer meat than they are to ingest mad-cow proteins by eating beef, Telling said.

"It's clearly there in the meat, but in very small quantities," said Miller, also a co-author of the new paper.

"We've been saying for 10, 11 years now, 'Don't consume deer or elk that appear to be sick,"' Miller said. "If anything, this confirms that our standing recommendations are appropriate."
John Pape, an epidemiologist with the state health department, agreed.

He just submitted a paper showing that the incidence of Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease in Colorado is no higher than it is elsewhere, even in places without chronic wasting disease.

"We can't exclude that possibility, that a rare (human) case could occur, but it's certainly not occurring at a high rate," Pape said.

The new study suggests that experts can monitor the incidence of chronic wasting disease by taking muscle samples from wild animals, Telling said.

Previously, the only reliable tests for the disease involved killing deer, elk or moose to test brain, lymph or spinal tissue.


- Rich

 

[larrbo]

I am from California, and unfortunately last year was the first time in about 20 years I failed to draw an out of state tag. I know the rules two years ago were that you needed to bone out your animal or take it to a processor such as a locker plant. They may have changed the rules last year when I wasn't looking.

 

[Tupenator]

You are right. If you had your meat processed out of state, then you were allowed to bring it in.

But if CWD is now in the Meat (as they are reporting), are they going to ban all wild game altogether?

Living in Ca, you know that this state does some wild things. It wouldn't surprise me.


- Rich

 

[larrbo]

A good friend of mine runs a local locker plant and keeps up on all of rules. I will talk to him and post what he has to say.

 

[DougW]

"ban all wild game altogether"?

Well, I guess they better ban beef and chicken too because the presence of disease in those meats is MUCH higher than the incidence of prions in deer.

Oh I forgot, beef and chicken involve big $$s, so they can't ban them.

 

[manny15]

brought a deer back from Canada and I decided to have the skull plate boiled first before coming across the boarder in Montana no one asked much just admired the rack...Hmmmm

 

[kilowatt]

That check-point at Truckee, CA has not been "manned" much at all since CA is low on funds to support the place.
Came back into CA twice from two hunts and never seen a sole there, this was in Oct. and again in Nov.

In 2004 never seen a person or checked back then either.

Not saying your story might be wrong, just stating what I observed in two trips during the hunting seasons.

Brian

 

[mtmiller]

Manny, MT does not currently regulate carcasses or skulls crossing the border, state or provincial. Currently....

 

[tylercreek2]

LAST EDITED ON Jan-28-06 AT 11:43AM (MST)[p]ok not saying anythings right or wrong here , will just say what we have seen coming back in from utah on 15 , at the utah to nev state check station is usually a volantary (spelling) check point ran by biologist type people , we went once and were treated pretty poorly by a woman that was very vocal in saying hunting should be banned , we have since just driven through as though we are just traveling , this year they either were'nt there or i didnt see them , at the calif check point just east of barstow , you are hardly ever stopped for anything , as stated is hardly even manned , and what they are checking are the big rigs , if you are stopped just tell them you are coming from vegas (which you are) and through you go , now with that being said we've never had the horns or anything visable , and we have taken 4 critters in since the reg change here in ca and have never been asked anything by anyone including meat lockers ,,,

 

[tylercreek2]

and yes we have been bringing the meat back in as per regs since they have changed ,,,,,

 

[SMOKESTICK]

The following story appeared in the Casper Star Tribune today. This sums it up really quite well. Dr. Terry Kreeger explains things quite well.


Hunters shouldn't panic over CWD study, state says

By JEFF GEARINO
Southwest Wyoming bureau
GREEN RIVER -- A new study on chronic wasting disease shouldn't panic Wyoming hunters and others into not eating venison, Game and Fish Department officials said.

There is absolutely no evidence to suggest that hunters and others who consume venison containing the proteins that cause the deadly brain ailment chronic wasting disease will get the disease, according to Wyoming Game and Fish Department scientists.

A new report in Friday's issue of the journal Science said people who eat venison meat from CWD-infected deer could swallow small quantities of the disease-causing proteins, known as prions. The report was prepared by Colorado and Kentucky scientists who found "significant" amounts disease-causing prion proteins in the hamstring muscle of deer dying from chronic wasting disease, the Denver Post reported.

Wyoming officials said the risk of death to humans who eat such meat appear nonexistent.

"Nobody has ever died from CWD and people have been eating (deer meat that could contain prions) for 25 years," said Terry Kreeger, Supervisor of the Game and Fish Department's Veterinary Research Services.

"We find no evidence from the epidemiological perspective or any investigations that humans get this disease," he said in a phone interview. "There is some very good, very compelling research out there that says its very highly unlikely that humans can get this disease."

CWD is a transmissible disease found in some deer and a few elk that attacks the central nervous system of the animal, causing the infected animal to basically waste away. The disease is 100 percent fatal to animals that contract it and there is currently no known cure for the disease.

The disease was first detected in the Rocky Mountain region in 1967. It was found in Wyoming by the end of that decade and has been endemic in an approximately 12,000 square-mile area of southeastern Wyoming and northwestern Colorado for more than 30 years.

The movement of the disease in recent years to areas near Worland in the Big Horn Mountains and in the Sierra Madres marking the first discovery of CWD west of the Continental Divide, has prompted concerns that the disease could arrive at some of the 22 supplemental feedgrounds operated by Game and Fish in western Wyoming and at the National Elk Refuge in Jackson.

Kreeger called the new Science study "one more piece of the puzzle" in the CWD research effort.

Scientists still don't know whether the deer prions can sicken people, researcher Glenn Telling, a molecular biologist at the University of Kentucky and a co-author of the new study, told The Denver Post. The finding, he told the newspaper, "raises the stakes."

Previously, Kreeger said, researchers could only detect prions in the central nervous system of deer and elk and in organs such as spleen and lymph nodes.

"As the scientific process evolved, we realized that prions were probably being transported in the blood and if so, one's got to assume that there's some prions in the meat tissue," he said. "Now it does appear (the study shows) that prions are in the meat at some level."

Kreeger said the study's researchers basically took extracts of the CWD-infected deer meat and injected it into mice.

"With this model, this wasn't just a mouse, it was a mouse that was made basically into a very good miniature deer in regards to its susceptibility to CWD ... it was primed, if you will, for exposure to CWD prions regardless of the source," said Kreeger.

"But what the mouse wasn't was a miniature human ... they've done similar studies in the past with mice that were like little humans and mice that were like little elk," he said.

"They injected the CWD prions with the mouse elk and they all died and they injected CWD prions into the human mice and none of them died," Kreeger said.

"So basically the reality of this research, from a pure scientific perspective, is that if a deer eats the muscle of another CWD-infected deer, then that deer could get CWD," he said.

"But it's total speculation to move that to humans eating deer muscle. Any extrapolation to humans is totally speculative."

Kreeger noted that tens of millions of people at mad cow-infected beef in the 1990s and only 150 people actually contracted the disease.

"I think the public is smart enough to do that same kind of assessment (with CWD)," he said. "Some people are uncomfortable with the risk, so it really all comes down to an individual's risk assessment. For people who are risk tolerant and analyze all the information, this is probably no big deal."

 

[tylercreek2]

LAST EDITED ON Jan-28-06 AT 05:32PM (MST)[p]from ca dfg ,,,



On June 16, 2003, the Fish and Game Commission adopted regulations restricting the importation of hunter-harvested deer and elk into California to replace the emergency regulations enacted in 2002. These emergency regulations were in effect immediately and lasted 120 days, allowing DFG time to develop permanent regulations. The emergency regulations allowed deer/elk carcasses to be transported into the State only if they were submitted to a certified meat processor within 72 hours of entry. Heads for taxidermy were allowed into the State if the heads were submitted to a taxidermist within 72 hours of entry. The meat processor and the taxidermist processing hunter-harvested deer and elk from out-of-state had to dispose of unused tissues, brain and spinal column in a landfill approved for carcass or undergo incineration.

The new regulations eliminated the 72 hour grace period and do not allow the importation of any brain or spinal column tissue. Other body parts allowed by the proposed regulations include: Quarters and other portions of meat with no spinal column or head attached; hides with no heads attached; clean skull plates with antlers attached; antlers only; finished taxidermy heads; and upper canine teeth.

This regulation is necessary to minimize the risk of transport of the CWD prion into California. There is a theoretical risk that CWD could be transported into California in a CWD-infected carcass, and due to improper disposal of infected body parts (brain, spinal cord and lymph nodes), could potentially expose our native free-ranging deer/elk to the disease. No infectivity has been detected in skeletal muscle tissue, therefore, removal of nervous and lymphatic tissue from meat should remove the prion from an infected carcass.

>>>> Regulations

?712. Restriction of Importation of Hunter-Harvested Deer and Elk Carcasses.

No hunter harvested deer or elk (cervid) carcass or parts of cervid carcass shall be imported into the State, except for the following body parts:
(a) boned-out meat and commercially processed cuts of meat.
(b) portions of meat with no part of the spinal column or head attached.
(c) hides with no heads attached.
(d) clean skull plates (no meat or tissue attached) with antlers attached.
(e) antlers with no meat or tissue attached.
(f) finished taxidermy heads.
(g) upper canine teeth (buglers, whistlers, ivories).

New section filed 6-5-2003; operative 6-5-2003

 

[manny15]

LAST EDITED ON Jan-28-06 AT 10:08PM (MST)[p]well I geuss we have to police ourselfs since the check points are un-maned, a meat processor scare's me more than a CWD infected deer or elk...

I forgot to mention, I read that in the bovine strand after cremation the virus was still alive?

 

[eelgrass]

The check station on Hwy 395 north of Reno wasn't open either this year. Not that I had anything to declare......

Steve

 

[madmike]

It sounds alot like anti-hunter bias research. The fact that alot of people have eaten deer and elk from these areas for many years without contracting the disease is interesting. It concerns me but not enough to stop hunting. I have forgotten the term from statistics class but it basically say you can manipulate the data to get any answer you want.