Mississippi CWD


Mississippi announces dead deer found with fatal disease

Published:Friday, February 9th 2018, 5:12 pm CST

Updated:Friday, February 9th 2018, 5:12 pm CST


JACKSON, Miss. (AP) - Mississippi's efforts to keep out a debilitating deer disease appear to have failed.

The state Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks announced Friday that a white-tailed deer found dead Jan. 25 in Issaquena County has tested positive for chronic wasting disease. It's the first deer found in Mississippi with the disease.

The contagious and fatal neurological disease typically causes deer to have tremors and other movement problems and lose weight. The disease was already present among deer in Arkansas and 23 other states.

The department is ordering hunters to stop supplemental feeding of wildlife in Claiborne, Hinds, Issaquena, Sharkey, Warren and Yazoo counties as part of its response plan.

Mississippi last year banned import of dead deer carcasses from affected areas in hopes of keeping out the disease.

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Dang!! It’ll be here soon.

damnit! We all knew it was a matter of time.

I figure the big interest in EHD here by the dept indicates it's here already.

Their response probably means corn is dead here in alabama

Please clarify what you mean. The two diseases are nowhere near related in their transmission, symptoms or death rates. EHD is a virus transmitted by biting flies called midges and has been present for thousands upon thousands of years. CWD has been known since 1967 and although the origins are sketchy it’s not a virus, and not transmitted by insects

Prion diseases are a totally different set of things than viral diseases.

At least Issaquena County is on the west side of MS as far away from AL as you can get.

What causes CWD? Or does anybody know for sure?

From what I have read, the Prions are like little worms. They actually bore holes in the animals brain like mad cow disease. I believe they are passed by direct contact with other deer, but don't quote me on that, it was several years ago that I read an article about it.

Prions are basically negative proteins that attack a neutralize healthy proteins. You can not kill them with regular cooking. Mad Cow disease was a prion disease cause by cattle being fed cattle scraps to boost protein intake. Even though McDonalds cooked their burgers to proper temp the Mad Cow prions were still there and it killed a lot people in Europe.

We had a patient a few years back that died from prion disease here in Ala. They did not know how he caught it, but his wife told us it was suspected from a surgery he had. The prion in question can't be killed by bleach or even in the Autoclave to sterilize the medical equipment!!! Scared us because we were exposed to body fluids and they are not very sure how it transmits. I finally said oh well, we all gotta go. It will probably kill supplemental feeding in Alabama.

Interesting article I read on AGWEB last week

https://www.agweb.com/article/chronic-wasting-disease-a-time-bomb-for-agriculture-naa-chris-bennett/

Uptake in a laboratory isn’t real-world confirmation, but Richards finds the implications disturbing. In addition, CWD expansion across the U.S. compounds the infectivity issue. “With the geographic footprint of CWD greatly expanded, we have to ask if plant material really moves infectious material. We have to contemplate the question because agriculture would be such a huge mechanism for disease movement,” he says.

In theory, take a county with a 40% CWD rate in a whitetail population. If 20 whitetail typically feed in-and-out of a given wheat field, eight of those deer are CWD-positive. An adult deer defecates roughly 12 times per day and urinates at a higher frequency. After harvest, if the wheat straw is rolled, statistical probability places a good deal of fecal material in the bales. “It’s not a far-fetched idea for infectious material to move in agricultural commodities,” Richards says. “This is not really on the ag industry radar, but it comes up regularly in conversations among scientists. We don’t know if transmission happens, but it must be kept on the radar screen.”

“There was once a time when people said mad cow disease could never cross the species barrier. Almost 300 human deaths and an industry disaster later, it’s pretty simple to see why we keep on conducting the science and relying strictly on what the evidence shows,” he adds.

Nichols cites several studies where plant roots grown in hydroponic or spiked soil solutions were exposed to CWD material. The stem and leaf tissue subsequently tested positive for infected prions, despite no contact with the CWD material. However, high levels of laboratory exposure don’t necessarily equate with field environments. “The results are disconcerting, but what really matters is what happens in the real world. The next level of inquiry is to find out if there is any threat via agriculture crops,” Nichols says.

“There is no scientific conclusion, but the questions raised could impact international trade. Right now, we don’t know what, if any, threat exists,” she continues.

Clausen takes a dim view of CWD containment and believes the disease will continue to creep into additional states: “I’m a country boy. Basic epidemiology of disease control is to contain and quarantine. Deer farm or deer carcass, we have to prevent the movement of all CWD material, dead or alive.”

It is incumbent on the agriculture industry to consider the ramifications of CWD spread through agricultural commodities, according to Clausen. “Sometimes we just seem to bounce from crisis to crisis without enough preparation or foresight. Corn or alfalfa, CWD uptake has been demonstrated in plants. Whether the uptake is infectious, that research hasn’t been done.”

“Everyone at least needs to wake up to the potential of CWD to move in crops because it would shake up agriculture as we know it,” Clausen says. “We’re all responsible to take a precautionary approach and consider what could happen.”

This is not good.

The possibility of plant material helping spread it concerns me. A deer with CWD salivates-chews or maybe pees on plants, others ingest or sniff it and somehow get the prions IF that's possible.

In any case it was only a matter of time for it to be here in the Deep South and will be found in Alabama at some point.

Does this mean the day will come when we can't eat venison anymore? What do people do in infected states? Is there a field test for the presence of the disease?

In laboratory tests macaques were infected by prions after being fed CWD + deer meat.

No instant field test at this time. No major links showing where it transmits to humans though that could change. People in infected areas have been eating the meat for years ........ this just didn't show up overnight.

Oh man I hope not....I don't want that sh1t down here...I love a good cube steak....