‘Zombie deer disease’ epidemic spreads in Yellowstone as scientists raise fears it may jump to humans

Lee Duna@lemmy.nz to News@lemmy.world – 426 points –
‘Zombie deer disease’ epidemic spreads in Yellowstone as scientists raise fears it may jump to humans
theguardian.com
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It can however totally spread from deer to person if we decide to eat it.

So basically treat it like mad cow disease and don't eat meat from dubious sources. Got it

Sounds to me like venison is out of the picture in general right now.

Too bad, venison is the best chili meat IMO.

Just submit your deer for testing and if it comes back clean you can safely eat it, easy.

Get the hunter or butcher to yank the lymph nodes and have them tested.

For the most part tho hunters don't harvest visibly sick animals ... for good reason.

Farmers don't harvest obviously sick cows, but BSE still spread in the UK.

I don't know that I would be willing to take the risk right now.

You're right. Part of that was due to some capitalist who decided that all the leftovers fom butchering cattle could be ground up and made into cattle feed ... and all the sick and dead cattle were added into that as well (so the yards wouldn't have to lose any money).

They don't do that anymore for obvious reasons, so BSE is still found occasionally but no where near the numbers we had in the 90's.

and don’t eat meat from dubious sources.

Have you ever actually seen the inside of a factory farm? Things don't get more "dubious" than that.

Well im with you on how gross factory kill floors are but I'm still recklessly confident that one thing i won't find in there is a deer.

If there is a super-pathogen spreading amongst wild animals the chance that this pathogen mutated in a factory farm is much, much higher than it mutating in the wild.

Of course, we're talking about a prion here and not viruses or bacteria... but the point still stands.

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